AstraZeneca targets $1.5 billion in annual savings, beats quarterly forecasts

By Pushkala Aripaka and Patrick Wingrove

Oct 30 (Reuters) - AstraZeneca on Friday unveiled a restructuring programme aimed at funding investment in its drug pipeline, but gave few details on how it would achieve expected annual savings of about $1.5 billion.

Shares in the Anglo-Swedish drugmaker rose about 3% in morning trade after it also beat third-quarter sales and profit forecasts and maintained its 2026 outlook.

AstraZeneca is increasing investment across its business as CEO Pascal Soriot seeks to convince investors the company remains on track to achieve its target of $80 billion in annual revenue by 2030, despite recent clinical trial setbacks. The target relies in part on about 20 expected new drug launches.

"With multiple potential blockbuster assets in late-stage development and transformative technologies scaling rapidly, we are on track to deliver our 2030 ambition and to sustain growth through the next decade," Soriot said in a statement.

RESTRUCTURING PLAN

The company said the three-year programme, running through 2029, would reallocate resources across its business and generate annualised savings of about $1.5 billion, which would be reinvested mainly in its pipeline of more than 180 projects.

However, AstraZeneca provided few details. It did not say whether the programme would involve job cuts, though it expects to incur up to $2 billion of one-off restructuring charges.

Drugmakers are facing growing investor scrutiny over the strength of their pipelines as patents expire on established blockbuster medicines and future growth becomes increasingly dependent on successful late-stage trial results.

British rival GSK is also pursuing a cost-saving programme.

Questions over AstraZeneca's pipeline have intensified following setbacks involving camizestrant and Wainua. However, investors have generally remained confident that the breadth of the company's late-stage portfolio leaves it well placed to absorb disappointments.

THIRD-QUARTER BEAT

Core earnings for the quarter were $2.79 per share as revenue rose 7% at constant exchange rates to $16.21 billion, beating analysts' forecasts of $2.59 per share and $15.94 billion respectively.

Growth was driven by cancer and rare-disease medicines. Oncology revenue rose 17% to $7.77 billion, helped by a 35% jump in Enhertu sales to $969 million and a 26% rise in Imfinzi sales to about $2 billion.

The gains helped offset pressure from older products facing generic competition. Sales of diabetes drug Farxiga fell 25% to $1.61 billion.

AstraZeneca reported operating expenses of $27.56 billion in the first nine months of 2026, up 7% from a year earlier. It said costs would rise again in the fourth quarter, in line with seasonal trends.

The annualised benefits from the restructuring programme equate to roughly 4% of 2025 operating expenses of $34.36 billion.

With 2026 guidance unchanged, analysts said investor attention is increasingly turning to 2027, when AstraZeneca expects a series of late-stage trial results that it says could support more than $20 billion in peak annual sales.

($1 = 0.7481 pounds)

(Reporting by Pushkala Aripaka, Sri Hari N S in Bengaluru and Patrick Wingrove in London; Editing by Joe Bavier and Mark Potter)