Speaker 1: Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio news.
Speaker 2: Well, as you know, tariff talks continuing, as do presidential
Speaker 2: statements about more manufacturing back here in the United States.
Speaker 2: The pharmaceutical industry among the latest to be targeted by
Speaker 2: President Trump, who made comments Monday from Scotland.
Speaker 3: We'll be announcing on pharmaceuticals sometime in the very near future.
Speaker 3: We have a very big plan on pharmaceuticals. We want
Speaker 3: to bring a lot of the pharmaceuticals back to America.
Speaker 3: Will you know the way they should be. We're going
Speaker 3: to want to be making a lot of them ourselves,
Speaker 3: all of them in a sense. But you also have
Speaker 3: a good pharmaceutical business. We'll be dealing with you on pharmaceuticals.
Speaker 2: All right. That, of course, was President Trump on Monday
Speaker 2: from Scotland. We've got a great voice on this and
Speaker 2: really the overall pharma industry. Big Pharma. A company that
Speaker 2: reported earnings earlier today. We're talking about Astrazenica. Eighty hours
Speaker 2: of the company, by the way, are rallying more than
Speaker 2: four percent in today's session. Great to have with us
Speaker 2: in studio. Pascal Sorio. He is Astrozenica's chief executive officer.
Speaker 2: Also with us a member of our editorial team here
Speaker 2: at Bloomberg knows this company and industry so well as
Speaker 2: Bloomberg News health reporter Madison Muller. Pascal, by the way,
Speaker 2: also a former CEO of Genentech. Thank you, thank you
Speaker 2: for joining us.
Speaker 4: Welcome, thank you for having me. It's very a pleasure,
Speaker 4: thank you.
Speaker 2: It's a pleasure for us. Big space, a space that's
Speaker 2: certainly garnered the attention of President Trump. I am curious,
Speaker 2: you know, in terms of the President talking about more
Speaker 2: manufacturing in the United States, and I know you guys
Speaker 2: are making some further investments here, talk to us about
Speaker 2: how presidential policy is impacting maybe your business.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean, I think, first of all, it's a
Speaker 5: great question. But first of all, it's important to really
Speaker 5: think about what every country.
Speaker 4: Would want to do. Every country would want.
Speaker 5: To make sure they can and they can secure the
Speaker 5: health of their citizens.
Speaker 4: It's a question of national security.
Speaker 5: So nobody should be surprised that the president wants to
Speaker 5: reshore manufacturing or pharmaceutical products. I personally, I have seen
Speaker 5: this happen since several years, and we decided several years
Speaker 5: ago to increase some manufacturing footprint in the US. So
Speaker 5: we can actually manufacture many scenes for American patients in America.
Speaker 5: Every country would want to do that, and a big
Speaker 5: country like America, of course, kind of thought to do it.
Speaker 1: You said that you made that decision several years ago.
Speaker 1: How much of the fifty billion dollar pledge was planned
Speaker 1: before the President threatened these terraffts.
Speaker 5: Well, we've been pursuing this strategy of manufacturing in China
Speaker 5: for China, in the US for the US since five
Speaker 5: six years and quite frankly, COVID actually showed us we
Speaker 5: were on the right track because we all saw what
Speaker 5: happened during COVID, and so we accelrated this movement and
Speaker 5: sour fifty billion commitment is a commitment to R and
Speaker 5: D but also commitment to manufacturing. We announced together with
Speaker 5: the Governor of Virginia, a multi billion dollar investment in
Speaker 5: manufacturing in Virginia, and the Governor of Virginia has been
Speaker 5: incredibly fast with this team, thirty three days to reach
Speaker 5: an agreement. It's incredible, so we're very happy to be there.
Speaker 5: We are building a new R and D site in
Speaker 5: Kendle Square, Cambridge, Massachusett, with twenty five hundred scientists that
Speaker 5: we'll be working there, and there's more to come. We're
Speaker 5: just finishing the build of a cels Rup manufacturing site
Speaker 5: in Rockville, Maryland. We've expanded in California. So so it's
Speaker 5: a sort of multi plane effort across many states across
Speaker 5: the US.
Speaker 6: You know, you've said that Virginia obviously has made it
Speaker 6: easy to make manufacturing investments there in North Carolina is
Speaker 6: pretty similar. Are there other states in the US where
Speaker 6: you're having these types of good conversations that are you know,
Speaker 6: incentivizing businesses like yours to invest.
Speaker 5: Well, you know, it's hard for me to point the
Speaker 5: point that any state that is better than another.
Speaker 4: Let me just say that we have.
Speaker 1: No problem from different in New Jersey.
Speaker 5: Let me let me just say that the company like
Speaker 5: ours follow the science. So science is key, and so
Speaker 5: you need to be able to recruit the right scientences,
Speaker 5: the right engineers. And in Virginia you can do this
Speaker 5: because you have some of the best university universities. The
Speaker 5: other part is dealing with partners in a public sector
Speaker 5: that understand us.
Speaker 4: That we trust each other, we can move fast.
Speaker 5: You know, I always tell people in our company talk
Speaker 5: about as Tazenica speed, because there's a lot of competition.
Speaker 5: We need to move fast. I've learned Virginia speed. The
Speaker 5: governor has moved so quickly. So this is the kind
Speaker 5: of thing we want to see, whether it's in America,
Speaker 5: in a state or in a country. We want speed
Speaker 5: and we want people who understand how we think.
Speaker 1: You want speed. You want people to understand how you
Speaker 1: think you want to You said you want to follow
Speaker 1: the science. There has been criticism that Robert F. Kennedy, Junior,
Speaker 1: the Secretary of Health and Human Services, has not necessarily
Speaker 1: always followed the science with his comments when it comes
Speaker 1: to medicine, when it comes to drugs, when it comes
Speaker 1: to vaccines. How do you look at that and his
Speaker 1: role there.
Speaker 5: Well, you know, I'm not here to actually get involved
Speaker 5: in political discourses. Let me just say that as a company,
Speaker 5: science is at the heart of everything we do. The
Speaker 5: reason we have such a large oncology pipeline in particular
Speaker 5: and beyond this is because we've focused on science for
Speaker 5: the last ten twelve years. And America is where science
Speaker 5: in our industry is happening. And that's why it's so
Speaker 5: critical to preserve this biosciences leadership. The US has globally
Speaker 5: China is also becoming a very big source of innovation
Speaker 5: in our industry. Your open fortunately is falling behind for
Speaker 5: a variety of reasons. So innovation is happening here. We
Speaker 5: need to keep this going.
Speaker 4: We need to.
Speaker 5: Actually continue supporting the leadership. And that's why we invest
Speaker 5: fifty billion dollars in this country, not only in manufacturing
Speaker 5: but also in R and D.
Speaker 2: What about China, I'd love you to kind of explore
Speaker 2: that a little bit. What are you investing in and
Speaker 2: building out in China and what might surprise our audience
Speaker 2: about the innovation that's happening in China, especially when it
Speaker 2: comes to pharmaceuticals.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I think my great question, and I think we
Speaker 4: need to start.
Speaker 5: With the the hypothesis, the assumption that basically the more
Speaker 5: products or the more innovation exists in the world, the
Speaker 5: better it is for everybody, for every patient, because if
Speaker 5: you have a patient with cancer, the only thing that
Speaker 5: you care about is to be cured if you can
Speaker 5: be cured, right, And so innovation in China has really
Speaker 5: ramped up very rapidly in the last few years. China
Speaker 5: has gone from making generics to me toos to Metwo
Speaker 5: plus what we call meet two plus in our industry
Speaker 5: to truly innovate these days, innovate in new technologies and
Speaker 5: cell therapy in si RN, in many many technologies, and
Speaker 5: so China has become the second engine of innovation, not
Speaker 5: as big as the US. The US remains the leader
Speaker 5: in that field, but China is ramping up very quickly.
Speaker 2: Is the administration with some of it, some would say
Speaker 2: questionable disruptive policies. There's been a lot of reporting about
Speaker 2: scientists kind of leaving the United States and going elsewhere.
Speaker 2: Are you seeing signs of that, whether it's to Europe,
Speaker 2: to China to elsewhere because of not supporting, you know,
Speaker 2: academia and academic universities. Some of that seems to be
Speaker 2: coming back.
Speaker 5: But yeah, but you know, in these things, it's always
Speaker 5: difficult to discern what is anecdotal versus what is systemic.
Speaker 5: What we have seen in China is really a substantial
Speaker 5: return of scientists from the US but also from the
Speaker 5: UK and elsewhere, but not because of policy, simply because
Speaker 5: they could see opportunities in China. There is money, there
Speaker 5: is capital that can be invested. The Chinese are willing
Speaker 5: to take rise. The government has facilitated the return of
Speaker 5: the scientists, and they've come back. But I can tell
Speaker 5: you that a lot of the scientists we work with
Speaker 5: and China in about the companies that we partner with,
Speaker 5: many of these people are American, the American Chinese. I
Speaker 5: mean they go back and forth, back and forth. There
Speaker 5: are bridged between the US and China. But they've gone
Speaker 5: to China because of the opportunities to create a company,
Speaker 5: be funded, tach risk and and.
Speaker 4: Hopefully be successful and buy and large. They've been quite successful.
Speaker 5: I want to say though, that the leadership remains with
Speaker 5: the US and we need to maintain this, of course,
Speaker 5: I mean the country needs to maintain this.
Speaker 6: There's been some concern though that companies like yours, you know,
Speaker 6: not necessarily astro, but big pharmaceutical companies are going to
Speaker 6: China for most of their biotech deals. Now, you know,
Speaker 6: what would you say to that and what would US
Speaker 6: biotech companies need to do to sort of attract investments
Speaker 6: from from well, I.
Speaker 5: Mean the first thing I would say is that if
Speaker 5: you're a patient, you don't care. What you want is
Speaker 5: a drug that will help you. Right, So when we
Speaker 5: do a deal with a Chinese company, typically it's because
Speaker 5: they've discovered a product and they need help to globalize it.
Speaker 5: Because discovering something in a lab is one thing. It
Speaker 5: doesn't require a huge amount of money. It require us
Speaker 5: very talented people, but the capital requirement is limited. When
Speaker 5: you want to develop globally, then you need to scale.
Speaker 5: You need billions of dollars of investment in phase two,
Speaker 5: phase three, and you need to scale. You need the people,
Speaker 5: the expertise. So what we do is we lice on
Speaker 5: sindle product and then we develop them globally and then
Speaker 5: bring them to patients so they start the innovation started
Speaker 5: in China but becomes a global medicine for everybody, so
Speaker 5: it really benefits everybody around the world.
Speaker 1: I want to go back to sort of a global
Speaker 1: domestic question the idea of your listing, and the Times
Speaker 1: of London has said that Astro Zeneka is looking to move.
Speaker 1: It's listening to the US.
Speaker 4: Are you going to do that?
Speaker 2: Well, you just shirt with us.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 5: We don't comment on rumors, and you know, as a
Speaker 5: company over the last ten years we've had so many rumors.
Speaker 5: We don't comment on rumors. The only thing I will
Speaker 5: say really is the United States is really core to
Speaker 5: our company. By two thousand and thirty, we expect fifty
Speaker 5: percent of our revenue to come out of the United States.
Speaker 5: Today it's forty four forty five percent. We're all tremendously
Speaker 5: in the US, and the first half. The US is
Speaker 5: the country that innovates, I just audio, but also the
Speaker 5: countries that uptake the innovation faster, patients benefit much faster.
Speaker 5: So we want to invest here and we want to
Speaker 5: grow here, and that is a very critical part of
Speaker 5: our company globally.
Speaker 2: Just curious in terms of growth. You know, we've talked
Speaker 2: about earnings and your cancer drugs are certainly important in
Speaker 2: terms of growth. Where do you see kind of the
Speaker 2: most significant growth trends when it comes to pharmaceuticals. We've
Speaker 2: spent the last what is it, Madison, the last couple
Speaker 2: of years talking about the obesity drugs and weight loss drugs,
Speaker 2: But where do you see it? We talk often about
Speaker 2: genes and genetic and immunotherapy. Where do you see the
Speaker 2: real growth coming in the next I don't know, five
Speaker 2: to ten years.
Speaker 5: The great question, but it's almost all of the above.
Speaker 5: I mean, of course, my check managing what I would
Speaker 5: call sant rolo abdominal fat because everybody talks about obesity,
Speaker 5: what really matter how much FA do you have in
Speaker 5: your abdomenins that surrounds you your liver, your punkreas, your
Speaker 5: heart and creates inflammation and insulin resistance and all the consequences.
Speaker 4: We can think about hypertension and others.
Speaker 5: So this is really a big epedemic globally. We need
Speaker 5: to address that and that's what companies like lilian Over
Speaker 5: are doing today and we are we want to do.
Speaker 4: This with all agents.
Speaker 5: But then you know, we have development in antibody drug conjugates,
Speaker 5: We have developments in by specific antibodies for cancer. One
Speaker 5: of the most exciting new technology is cell therapy because
Speaker 5: cells upy will apply to ematology, cancers, but also potentially
Speaker 5: sol tumors and immune diseases. We have no cases, small
Speaker 5: numbers early days, but small cases that young women who
Speaker 5: suffer from lupus, which is a terrible disease.
Speaker 2: Can be family member who has lucas, it.
Speaker 5: Can be I mean, these patients their life is about
Speaker 5: taking drugs. Theories with all the consequences. You can imagine
Speaker 5: the organs are destroyed over time by the disease, they
Speaker 5: can be cured. You have people with my looma that
Speaker 5: can be cured. And so as we progress this technology
Speaker 5: and make it more usable, is more easily usable, and
Speaker 5: more affordable, it can really transform many fields of medicine,
Speaker 5: phrom oncology to iminology.
Speaker 6: I know you've had an amazing tenure at Astra and
Speaker 6: there's sort of an obsession in the UK with your
Speaker 6: succession plans and what comes next. You know, not to
Speaker 6: say that you're leaving anything you don't. We don't want
Speaker 6: you to go. What do you want to accomplish before
Speaker 6: you and your tenure at Astra.
Speaker 5: Well, one of the things is that I wanted to
Speaker 5: do is have a great team, and I have a
Speaker 5: great team.
Speaker 4: That's it.
Speaker 5: I have really a fantastic team, and that's why what
Speaker 5: you should worry about my succession. We have a great
Speaker 5: team and people who can succeed me. So that's I
Speaker 5: think one thing, and we need to we constantly try
Speaker 5: to improve the team, not only my direct reports, but
Speaker 5: they are direct reports and the company as a whole.
Speaker 5: Two is the second piece is almost unachievable because science
Speaker 5: is never going to be stopping. And the more I progress,
Speaker 5: the older it gets, the more science get exciting and
Speaker 5: the more excited you. I mean, there's no better time
Speaker 5: to be in our industry than there's so much innovation,
Speaker 5: so much hope to cure diseases that can't be cured today.
Speaker 5: And the last thing was really to finish our site
Speaker 5: in Cambridge, because I keep joking internality, I want to
Speaker 5: have the two Cambridges, one in Cambridge, you care when
Speaker 5: in Cambridge and bos them.
Speaker 4: But that's for the joke.
Speaker 5: But the most exciting really is the science and the
Speaker 5: pursuit of new technologies and new products that will make
Speaker 5: a difference and change the few Joe medicine. So that's
Speaker 5: those other things I want to add, Rice, But I
Speaker 5: have to accept that some is going to catch up
Speaker 5: with me.
Speaker 2: And unless you create a pill that keeps us going,
Speaker 2: I'm kind of giving my fingers crossing exactly glp ones right.
Speaker 2: We think it's going to be. You're all, Pascal, we
Speaker 2: really enjoyed this. Thank you so much for having me
Speaker 2: for all the time. Pascal Sorio. He is astrosenic as
Speaker 2: chief executive officer, and of course Bloomberg News his own
Speaker 2: health reporter Madison Muller, always a must read on the
Speaker 2: Bloomberg and at bloomberg dot com,