Pfizer may open local R&D center - Haaretz

Subscribe to Print Edition

Wed., October 31, 2007 Cheshvan 19, 5768

Israel Time: 02:49 (EST+7)

web haaretz.com

Back to Homepage

Print Edition

Diplomacy

Defense

Arts & Leisure

Real Estate

Jewish World

National

Advertising

Magazine

Week's End

Business

Opinion

Rosner's Domain

Anglo File

Books

Travel

del.icio.us

Digg It! new

Pfizer may open local R&D center

By Ora Coren

Pfizer, the world's largest non-generic drugmaker, is in advanced talks to establish a research and development center in Israel. It will probably erect its center in the central Galilee, government sources say.

Pfizer representatives met with Industry, Trade and Labor Minister Eli Yishai two weeks ago to discuss the issue. Jerusalem circles think that the center could go up within six to eight months.

Pfizer spends $7 billion on R&D a year. The U.S. company changed its senior management last May, and a new center in Israel could become part of a fresh push to develop new drugs.

	Advertisement

Some of the company's vice presidents have visited Israel to consider either investing in an existing science incubator or establishing a new center modeled on tech incubators. The plan is apparently to collect early-stage projects from academic or research institutes and develop the molecules into pharmaceuticals. A similar biotechnology-focused incubator, owned by Teva, Hadasit and venture capital funds, is already operating in Jerusalem. The establishment of an R&D center in Israel by an international drugmaker has been a central goal of the Industry, Trade and Labor Ministry in recent years, in part to develop the biotech sector.

Establishment of such a center here could mean competition for Teva, which develops generic drugs based on proprietary drugs from companies like Pfizer. The New York-based company recently sued Teva for patent infringement in marketing of the generic version of Neurontin, which treats epilepsy.

Pfizer, which makes Viagra, ended 2006 with revenues of $48.4 billion and a net profit of $19.3 billion. These results include one-time income of $16.6 billion from the company's sale of its consumer products division to Johnson & Johnson. Nevertheless, Pfizer's profits were down 77 percent in the third quarter compared with the same period in 2006. Its quarterly profits totaled $761 million, and revenues declined by 8 percent to $12 billion, which it attributed among other things to fierce competition from makers of generic drugs.

Pfizer is one of the firms calling for Israel to amend its Pharmaceuticals Law. Pfizer says the law does not provide enough protection for the original developers of pharmaceuticals. The company, which has been kept up to speed on efforts by the Ministry of Industry, Trade and Labor to amend the law, has not predicated the establishment of an Israeli R&D center on a change in the law.

Pfizer and other international drug companies have successfully lobbied the U.S. government and the European Union to press for amending the law. In talks Yishai recently held in the United States with representatives of the U.S. Department of Commerce, the hosts stressed the importance of this issue. The Pharmaceutical Law is one factor in Israel's inclusion on the U.S. list of copyright-infringing nations. .

Apropos Viagra, recently the U.S. Food and Drug Administration ordered Pfizer to amend the paperwork that accompanies the drug. Specifically, the warning: use of Viagra to ease erectile dysfunction may cause hearing impairment. No less than 29 users since 1996 reported loss of hearing accompanied by ringing in their ears and other symptoms of trouble. Whether or how Viagra causes these conditions is unknown. But it is not the only drug implicated: so are Eli Lilly's Cialis and GlaxoSmithKline's Levitra.

Bookmark to del.icio.us


	China, Israel diverge
	With Livni in Beijing, China rejects Israel's call for tougher sanctions against Iran.


	Amending aliyah
	Interior Minister Sheetrit says Jews should not be granted automatic Israeli citizenship.

Today Online


	Bradley Burston: It's Judeo-Fascism Month in the state of Israel
	Responses: 116


	IDF's tactical upper hand over Hamas in Gaza is diminishing
	Responses: 161


	PA negotiator: No talks without timeline for Palestinian state
	Responses: 69


	Moshe Arens: What the Qassams are costing Israel
	Responses: 86


	Druze MK demands top cop's dismissal over Galilee clash
	Responses: 74

More Headlines
02:31 Security guard killed, 5 hurt in T.A. nightclub shootout


23:48 IDF strikes kill four Hamas men, wound 3 civilians


21:21 Druze MK demands top cop's dismissal over Galilee clash


18:43 Sheetrit: Jews should not be granted automatic Israeli citizenship


23:44 Egypt police: Gazans caught in tunnel members of Army of Islam


02:00 Prague again bans neo-Nazi march through Jewish quarter


22:45 EU urges Israel to reconsider cuts in energy supply to Gaza


16:08 China rejects Israel's call for tougher sanctions against Iran


17:24 PA negotiator: No talks without timeline for Palestinian state


22:12 Islamic Jihad: Syria 'anti-summit' postponed until Annapolis date set