The need to cut costs forces the Anglo-Swedish pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca to eliminate about 400 jobs in its US commercial operations. The cut will primarily affect the Wilmington, Delaware headquarters and some field, non-sales roles.
The company has about 14,400 employees in North America, recalls the 'Wall Street Journal'. About 70 of the positions to be eliminated will be on pending job vacancies, while 330 workers will be directly affected by the cuts, spokesman Tony Jewell said.
The specific areas have not yet been identified and the decisions will be completed by early December. "The changes will allow the company to compete in a challenging environment due to pricing pressure and the continued growth of generic drugs," the company said in a news release.
Many of the medicines 'branded' AstraZeneca will lose their patent protection in the coming years: from 2016, the commercial protection of two blockbusters, the anti-cholesterol Crestor (rosuvastatin) and the antipsychotic Seroquel Xr (quetiapine), will expire, while that on the antihypertensive Toprol Xl / Seloken (metoprolol) and on the anticancer Arimidex (anastrozole) has already fallen.
Barbara Di Chiara – October 10, 2011 – PharmaKronos
Aged 57, in 2010 he was paid £4,740,000 (€5,431,480)
