"Loss of patents we're ready for it, we're not afraid of it, and we have growth engines that will lead the change," Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd. (NYSE: TEVA; TASE: TEVA) CEO and president Jeremy Levin said today in a briefing for journalists at the company's Petah Tikva headquarters.
Levin was commenting on the main fear of Teva investors: the expected fall in the contribution of MS treatment Copaxone, the company's flagship product, responsible for about half its profits, with sales of some $4 billion last year. The patents protecting the drug will expire in 2015.
Levin also said, "We are an Israeli company, and we will remain an Israeli company. Before I came to Teva there was something good, and it's possible to do something better. Teva's future is very interesting. I know it can be done, because I know the people and the market."
According to Levin, one in six prescriptions in the US is for Teva. "That's just the start; it can be done all over the world," he said.
He stated that Teva was built on values of honesty, respect, cooperation, excellence and leadership. "The example of that: Last year I was at the plant in Ashdod. For two hours, every quarter of an hour, there were rockets from Gaza. More than 95% of the workers turned up to the plant, and they told me that some of the drugs produced there end up in Gaza. While people fire rockets, we make medicines. The heart of this company is something special."
Last year, Levin appointed several new managers at Teva, and today he says that "Teva's management is the best group in the industry and the best I have worked with, united and varied."
Levin added, "We have to expand geographically. There are great economic changes taking place today, and a great deal of drug consumption will be in the East. We will be there, certainly."
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on April 11, 2013
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