Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd. (NYSE: TEVA; TASE: TEVA) chairman Phillip Frost told "Bloomberg" that the pharmaceutical company is changing its strategy and moving away from multi-billion dollar acquisitions.
He said, “Acquisitions don’t have to be major to be important. The idea of the multibillion-dollar type of acquisition is going to be reserved for very special cases going forward, in which the desirability is so compelling and so game-changing that everyone will feel it has to be done.”
Frost owns about $815 million of Teva shares.
He said, “There is the opportunity for product acquisitions, for small company acquisitions, for technology acquisitions, and to bring in new people who themselves are capable of creating the new products."
Over the past decade alone, Teva has made 25 acquisitions including five of more than $3 billion each.
Speaking about Teva's new CEO, Frost said, “On the novel product side, Jeremy brings experience to the table that we didn’t really have at Teva before."
On Multiple Sclerosis treatment Copaxone he said, “Copaxone will be around for quite a while - I’m sure of it. At a certain point, it’s possible a generic will affect certain markets, but the product itself will continue to be important in other markets.”
Meanwhile, Teva CEO Jeremy Levin paid a visit to a Teva plant in Ashdod, which has come under heavy rocket fire from the Gaza Strip in the past week. "These men and women are the embodiment of Teva’s values, making the medicines we send abroad even in the most difficult of times and ensuring we keep our commitment to patients worldwide. These employees make the medicines that cross borders - even across Israel’s most immediate border - in order to uphold Teva’s covenant with patients around the world," Levin wrote in a letter to Teva employees worldwide following the visit, during which sirens warning of incoming rockets sounded several times.
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on November 21, 2012
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