Teva CFO Dan Suesskind says, “The German market is undergoing a transformation and is beginning to interest us. He made the comment at today’s CIBC World Markets Israel conference. Last week, Mylan Laboratories Inc. (NYSE:MYL) outbid Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd. (Nasdaq: TEVA; TASE: TEVA) for the generic business of Germany’s Merck KGaA (XETRA:MRK).
Commenting on the deal, Suesskind said, “We don’t like to hire 1,000 sales reps to sell a product. We didn’t want to buy at yesterday’s price what will cost a lot less tomorrow.”
Suesskind said the European market as a whole, and not Germany, was undergoing changes. He added that Teva was most interested in the European business of the “acquisition that we almost made”, as he put it, of Merck generics.
In the US, Teva predicts the expiration of patents on drugs with annual sales of $90 billion, including $35 billion in sales for drugs that Teva expects to obtain exclusivity for generic versions. “We have a better pipeline than ever,” said Suesskind. “It is larger than the pipeline of any other company, and at least twice the size of the pipeline of the second largest company.”
Suesskind said that Teva was the 15th largest company on Nasdaq in terms of market cap. “We’re a great cash flow generator.” He said that company’s growth engines included its global deployment, large number of products, and ethical drug programs. He added that Teva’s biogenerics program was the best among the world’s generic drug companies.
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes.co.il - on May 20, 2007
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