By Adria Calatayud
AstraZeneca outlined plans to invest 300 million pounds ($405.5 million) in the U.K., after the drugmaker reported higher first-quarter earnings mainly thanks to growing sales of its cancer medicines.
The U.K. company has pledged over the past year to make multibillion-dollar investments in the U.S. and China, its two biggest markets, through the end of the decade. While its U.K. outlay represents a fraction of those amounts, it signals a shift in AstraZeneca's stance toward the country where it is based.
The move reverses AstraZeneca's decision to pause planned investments in its home country last year amid industry worries the country wasn't rewarding innovation. Its investment comes after the U.K. and the U.S. struck a drug-pricing deal earlier this month, building on an agreement in principle reached in December under which Britain would spend more on new medicines in exchange for avoiding tariffs on pharmaceutical exports to the world's largest drug market.
U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer told Parliament Wednesday that AstraZeneca's investment had been made possible by the country's recent pharma deal struck with the U.S. The company's chief executive, Pascal Soriot, said on a call with reporters the funding would go to expand the company's presence in Cambridge and Macclesfield.
AstraZeneca is the latest pharma company to set out U.K. investment plans in recent months. Spending commitments to the country amount to 1.4 billion pounds since the first U.K.-U.S. pharma deal was announced in December, according to a tally by the Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry, a trade group.
The company last year said it would invest $50 billion in U.S. research and manufacturing by 2030. In January, it said it planned to invest $15 billion in China through 2030.
Under Soriot, AstraZeneca has bet on its oncology business to drive growth in recent years, bringing new drugs to market and working to expand the labels of existing medicines. Oncology now accounts for about 44% of the group's revenue and for the bulk of its late-stage pipeline.
Strong demand for oncology drugs helped the company report rises in revenue and core earnings for the first quarter.
Revenue came to $15.29 billion, compared with $13.59 billion in the year-earlier period, with an 8% rise when excluding currency changes. Analysts had forecast revenue at $14.94 billion, according to consensus estimates compiled by Visible Alpha.
The revenue increase was driven by strong demand for oncology and rare-disease medicines, which posted double-digit growth. This offset a decline in sales of cardiovascular, renal and metabolism products ahead of the U.S. patent expiration of diabetes drug Farxiga, the best-selling medicine in AstraZeneca's history.
Quarterly net profit rose to $3.08 billion from $2.92 billion.
Core earnings per share--the company's preferred profit metric, which strips out exceptional items--were $2.58, up 5% at constant currency. Analysts expected $2.54, according to the same consensus.
The company reiterated its full-year guidance, which calls for revenue to rise by a figure in the mid-to-high single-digit percentage range and core EPS by a low double digit percentage.
Write to Adria Calatayud at adria.calatayud@wsj.com
Corrections & Amplifications
This item was corrected 1614 GMT to show that Pharma spending commitments to the country amount to 1.4 billion pounds since the first U.K.-U.S. pharma deal was announced in December, not 1.575 billion pounds.
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
04-29-26 1111ET
