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Biotech / Medical : PFE (Pfizer) How high will it go? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Ibexx who wrote (1540)	4/23/1998 8:04:00 PM
From: Anthony Wong	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 9523

Reuters - Pfizer says Viagra sales potential still unclear Thursday April 23, 5:17 pm Eastern Time NEW YORK, April 23 (Reuters) - Pfizer Inc. (PFE - news) chief executive William Steere told shareholders Thursday the company's new impotence drug, Viagra, has captured greater limelight than any other product in company history, but it was too early to gauge potential sales for the compound. During its debut week of April 10, a spectacular 36,263 new prescriptions were written for Viagra, according to sales audit firm IMS America. That is as many as 20 times the number of first-week sales encountered by most successful drugs. At the company's annual shareholders' meeting here, Steere said Viagra was ''certainly the drug that has attracted the most attention of any medicine we're ever launched.'' He told inquiring shareholders it was difficult to predict eventual sales for the blue pills, which retail for about $10 each and are aimed at a worldwide market of an estimated 50 million people with male erectile dysfunction. ''We haven't even (officially) launched Viagra yet,'' he said, referring to the fact the company has not yet begun advertising the drug, although it has reached drugstores and is now being prescribed. Steere said pent-up demand for Viagra, the first pill for impotence, probably accounted for much of its first-week success. He added a remaining litmus test will be how many customers decide to refill their prescriptions. ''The whole thing is such a phenomenon now,'' Steere said, showing a videotape of chock-a-block media coverage of Viagra from major network television programs. ''Everyone wants to know what (how much) we are going to sell of Viagra. There is no projection; we can't make one,'' Steere said. A clearer picture will emerge in coming months and be reflected in second quarter earnings results, he added. One shareholder asked Steere if he was concerned by reports Viagra was being prescribed over the Internet. ''It's something we're looking into to see if we can make it prohibited,'' Steere said, adding the practice of prescribing drugs over the Internet was apparently legal in some states. Steere said company lawyers were also at work to protect the Viagra trademark, which he said some companies were infringing by marketing unproven vitamins and other ''knockoff products'' with similar names as the Pfizer drug. ''There have been some knockoffs, absolute phonies,'' he said, adding that none could have had Viagra's effectiveness. Steere said Pfizer's market capitalization, which rose by over 80 percent to almost $100 billion in 1997, leaped to $150 billion in recent weeks -- allowing it to edge past Merck & Co (MRK - news) to become the nation's biggest-cap drug company. He said Pfizer intended to remain a tough competitor by plowing $2 billion into research and development in 1998, a shade more than the $1.9 billion spent in 1997. Company executives said Pfizer had 170 research projects in discovery and development stages. They added Pfizer advanced a record 19 new drug candidates into exploratory development in 1997, for a total of 55 compounds with a chance of becoming new prescription drugs. Sales of seven key pharmaceuticals launched in the 1990's accounted for 70 percent of worldwide prescription drug sales, Pfizer said, adding all of them would enjoy patent protection well into the next decade. Steere said the company had no immediate plans to split shares of Pfizer stock but added the matter could be considered later in the year. They ended up 15/16 to 115-7/16 Thursday. Steere said a split could be achieved either by convening another meeting of shareholders late in 1998 ''or waiting until this time next year'' for the next annual shareholder meeting.