GlaxoSmithKline claimed yesterday that it would hit a key sales target two years early, saying that its strategy was paying off in defiance of calls for the company to be broken up.
As it delivered a forceful response to the activism of Neil Woodford, the fund manager who played a key role in AstraZeneca’s rebuffing of Pfizer in 2014, and Och-Ziff, one of the world’s largest hedge funds, Britain’s biggest pharmaceuticals group announced annual core pre-tax profit of £5.1 billion, down 10 per cent.
In 2015, turnover rose by 6 per cent to £24 billion, still below its 2009 peak of £29 billion.
Glaxo said that its sales of new products had reached £2 billion in 2015, which put it on track to plug the