AstraZeneca spent more than $4 billion on deals this year to gain access to new technologies, Chief Financial Officer Aradhana Sarin said in an interview published on Oct. 30.
Smaller acquisitions had delivered the company's greatest success, Sarin said on Bloomberg Television's “AstraZeneca CFO on AI, Earnings, Restructuring Plan.” Buying businesses was less about increasing size than accessing innovation.
AstraZeneca used artificial intelligence across nearly every part of its business, including drug discovery, development, regulatory applications and manufacturing. The company was already seeing benefits, though Sarin gave no figures measuring the gains or how much faster trials could run.
“It's still early days,” she said. “I think the full benefit will take a long time.” The company was investing in the technology across its operations.
Returning to acquisitions, Sarin said innovation came from smaller biotechnology companies and universities as well as AstraZeneca's laboratories. The company sought access through partnerships, equity investments and acquisitions. It assessed deals by whether it could help a smaller business run clinical trials across countries or launch products worldwide.
AstraZeneca's drug-pricing agreement with the Trump administration would affect decisions over several years, including prices and countries chosen for new product launches. Sarin described the agreement as lowering prices for new medicines for American patients while seeking greater contributions from wealthier countries to the cost of developing drugs.
“It takes billions of dollars to actually get a drug from the bench to the market,” she said. She did not quantify the agreement's effect on profit margins.
Sarin said the agreement was not slowing the company's ability to bring medicines to market. In some European countries, however, securing reimbursement, which determines whether health systems pay for a medicine, was slower than obtaining approval. Pricing negotiations could extend that process.
AstraZeneca continued to engage with the U.S. administration over proposed restrictions on American investment in Chinese biotechnology companies. Sarin said partnerships and licensing agreements in China helped the industry and American patients gain access to innovation. She did not describe any outcome from those discussions.
Advances in cancer treatment were making cures a reality in some areas, including breast cancer, Sarin said. She also cited progress in pancreatic cancer and said earlier diagnosis increased the likelihood that targeted medicines could treat patients successfully.
Asked about affordability, Sarin said AstraZeneca set prices by assessing the benefit a medicine delivered. A product similar to existing treatments, or one extending survival by only a couple of months, would face limits on the prices buyers would accept.
She contrasted that with a hypothetical treatment curing half the patients in a clinical trial. Such a result could give young women with breast cancer another 20, 30 or 40 years of life, she said. She did not identify a treatment achieving that cure rate or give a price for one.
