Pfizer's cost-cutting focus no 'Kindler surprise'

One of three areas that company CEO Jeffrey Kindler highlighted during an analyst call covering his company's third quarter results was the steps being taking to meet its goal of reducing its cost structure by at least $1.5bn (€1.1bn) to $2bn by 2008. "We remain focused on driving a series of fundamental changes in the company to improve our performance and achieve a lower, more flexible cost base,"​ said Kindler. The measures being taken are indeed sweeping: "Specific cost reduction initiatives are varied and span most divisions, functions, markets and sites across Pfizer. Broad categories of activity are our sales force reductions, manufacturing and research site closures and offshoring and outsourcing",​ he said. When Kindler became CEO of Pfizer in July last year he said that "it was very clear…that this business needed to be fixed in a lot of ways." ​​At the end of last year he announced a company-wide cost-cutting programme which was to involve reducing overall headcount by 10 per cent and relying more on externalisation. The firm has been stepping up its activity in Asian geographies as part of this. In last week's conference call, both Kindler and company CFO Frank D'Amelio were optimistic, telling analysts that "we are making a lot of progress relative to the area of cost reduction."​ At the time of last year's restructuring announcement Pfizer had 98,000 employees - now it has 87,000. So far this year Pfizer has reduced its US sales force by about 20 per cent and said it is implementing similar reductions in most markets, along with sales force restructurings. In addition, the drug giant has also announced the closure of nine manufacturing plants this year, most recently in Sandwich, England, and in Groton Connecticut and Brooklyn, New York. Six research sites are also being canned, including one in Ann Arbor, Michigan. "To date, all transactions are proceeding according to plan,"​ said Kindler, adding that the vast majority of impacted research and development programs have been transferred to new locations and the reminder will be transferred by year end. "Furthermore, a wide array of offshoring and outsourcing opportunities are in various stages of implementation,"​ he said, indicating that manufacturing, logistics, back office finance, facilities, medical, legal and IT are among some of the functions being externalised in order to gain "financial and operational benefits". ​ Kindler also took pains to point out that for this year, cost savings in the selling, informational and administrative expense component of adjusted income, are ahead of plan. "We are now projecting a decrease in these expenses of about $600m on a constant currency basis… and we are continuing to take the necessary steps to meet our goal of reducing our total adjusted cost,"​ he said. Still, D'Amelio said he has adjusted cost of sales to be 15.5 per cent instead of 15.0 per cent for full year 2007. The company's emphasis on its cost-cutting strategy was delivered alongside the surprise announcement that it is abandoning its inhaled insulin product Exubera, which had only been on the market for a year and had been touted as a potential billion dollar a year blockbuster. In reality, sales largely failed to materialise and the decision to drop the product caused the firm to write off $2.8bn during the third quarter, not to mention the vast amounts already spent on development and commercialisation. Exubera's market failure is the latest of several events that have caused many to speculate over Pfizer's future financial situation and its ability to maintain its position at the top of pharma for the long term, in light of several of its biggest selling drugs having lost or about to lose patent protection and subsequently revenues. Two of its top sellers, the antidepressant Zoloft (sertraline) and Norvasc (amlodipine) - the most prescribed brand for high blood pressure worldwide - have both come off patent in the last 15 months. Revenues for the pair dropped by more than half, to $764m for the third quarter compared to this period last year as generic products continue to make their presence felt. And Pfizer's impending financial woes don't stop there: drugs representing 41 per cent of Pfizer's sales are coming off patent between 2010 and 2012, according to Prudential Equity Group's Timothy Anderson. These are Aricept (donepezil) for Alzheimer's, cholesterol-lowerer Lipitor (atorvastatin), erectile dysfunction drug Viagra (sildenafil citrate), Detrol (tolterodine) for incontinence and antipsychotic Geodon (ziprasidone). The biggest loss will be Lipitor, which provides one half of the revenue of all Pfizer's marketed products and had sales worth nearly $13bn in 2006. It is the world's biggest selling drug - raking in more than the next two biggest drugs put together, but it is due to come off patent in 2010. In the meantime, sales of the drug are already slowly trickling away, with the firm admitting during its third quarter results that it expects worldwide Lipitor sales for the full year of 2007 to be 3-5 per cent lower than last year. The blow of losing patent exclusivity on Lipitor will be even more keenly felt after development of its much-hoped successor torcetrapib was halted amid safety concerns last December. The drug was to be a combination treatment with Lipitor and had been pitched as a key foundation for Pfizer's cholesterol business, allowing it to defend its franchise once the Lipitor patent expired. Meanwhile, in its third quarter financial report, Pfizer said that along with its cost cutting strategy, it plans to improve its performance through "optimising revenue from our inline products and generating strong growth from our new products."​ Total sales for its inline products actually decreased 2 per cent in the third quarter to $9.3bn. This includes all its global products except those that it terms as "new,"​ having been launched after 2005, including Chantix, Eraxis, Exubera, Lyrica, Macugen, Revatio, Selzentry, Sutent and Zmax. It also excludes its off-patent products Zoloft and Norvasc. As mentioned above, several of Pfizer's inline products are facing impending patent loss. Pfizer's new products did see a rise in revenue for the quarter from $500m to $931m. This growth is positive but largely reliant on three drugs - central nervous system drug Lyrica, with sales of $465m, smoking-cessation treatment Chantix, with sales of $241, and anti-cancer drug Sutent. Pfizer did not publish any further breakdown in sales for this group, but Exubera has now been scrapped and some of the others are reportedly off to a slow start. What is also interesting is that in May last year Bear Stearns pharma analyst John Boris wrote in a client note that: "We continue to view Sutent, Lyrica, Exubera and Lipitor/torcetrapib as Pfizer's key new product opportunities as they account for approximately 70 per cent of our five-year incremental pharma revenue,"​ and that only half of these are now left standing.