Novartis raises sales guidance until 2028

Novartis NOVN raised its medium-term sales guidance on Thursday to 6% annual growth through 2028, driven by momentum of launched drugs and the prospect of upcoming launches.

The Swiss drugmaker was previously targeting mid-term currency-adjusted sales growth of at least 5% from 2023 to 2028.

However, the company said it was still expecting 5% sales growth per year during the 2024-2029 period, given its strong performance in 2024.

CEO Vas Narasimhan has cut jobs and spun off Novartis' generic drugs business Sandoz to narrow its focus on drug development in certain disease and technology areas.

The company, which will hold an investor event on Thursday, reaffirmed that it was targeting a core margin of at least 40% by 2027.

The group also raised the peak annual sales estimate for five drugs with multi-billion dollar sales potential, including breast cancer drug Kisqali with at least $8 billion, up from $4 billion seen previously.

Last month, it raised its 2024 earnings guidance for the third time, buoyed by wider use of its drugs, but its shares have since declined almost 9% as sales of radio-pharmaceutical Pluvicto disappointed investors, as did a write-down on German biotech company MorphoSys, which it is acquiring.

The Swiss company said Pluvicto, which contains radioactive particles to kill cancer cells, had at least $5 billion in peak sales potential, as against a "multi-billion" opportunity seen earlier.

Winning approvals for wider use of Pluvicto in prostate cancer would drive growth as many smaller treatment centres have yet to embrace the new treatment that was pioneered by large academic medical centres.

The company also said last month's $800 million impairment on MorphoSys was due to delays in the approval of its lead compound pelabresib, designed to treat a rare type of slowly progressing blood cancer.

Presentation slides on Thursday showed the drug to have "multi-billion" annual peak sales potential and would start to generate revenue before 2029.

The CEO, however, said in a call that there remained some uncertainty whether it would come to market at all, with a launch eyed in 2027 at the earliest because trial participants need longer drug-safety monitoring.