Novartis AG : Novartis CEO : On Track to Deliver Financial Targets
06/21/2012| 04:00am US/Eastern
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Swiss pharmaceutical company Novartis AG (NVS) expects sales this year to be roughly in line with last year's results, Chief Executive Joe Jimenez said in an interview Thursday, despite facing the expiration this year of the patent for its hypertension drug Diovan, one of its strongest-selling products.
"We're going to deliver sales that were in line with a year ago, even offsetting that patent expiration," Jimenez told CNBC from an economic forum in St. Petersburg, Russia.
He also said the company was taking a conservative approach to allocating capital.
"We're waiting to see what's happening in Europe," he said, adding that the level of debt in the U.S. is also cause for caution. While at the same time that we are investing in high-growth markets, we're taking a more conservative view on some of the more developed markets," he said.
Asked whether the U.S. President Barack Obama administration's health-care reforms would hurt the company's profitability this year and next, he said no.
"I don't think it's going to have that much of an impact."
He said Novartis would continue to operate in the U.S. "pretty aggressively."
Write to London bureau at generaldesklondon@dowjones.com
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