Vaccine groups take advantage of Wyeth exit

FT.com
Vaccine groups take advantage of Wyeth exit
Wednesday November 20, 10:06 am ET
By David Firn in London

The leading flu vaccine companies announced plans to expand their manufacturing capacity following Wyeth's decision to pull out of the market on Monday.

Aventis, the Franco-German healthcare group that dominates the flu market, said it would invest $150m in additional capacity at its factories in the US and France in an effort to double production by 2007.

PowderJect, the largest independent vaccine company, said it was speeding up its existing expansion plans. The group has already completed the first phase of a three-year expansion programme, increasing capacity to over 27m doses this season.

The company had planned to increase this further to 35m doses next year and 45m the following year. PowderJect now plans to hasten its expansion. However, it said it was too soon to give firm targets, it said.

Executives at PowderJect were said on Tuesday night to be "jumping with joy" at Wyeth's decision, which sent the UK company's already buoyant shares up 10p to 410p on Wednesday. The shares rose 60 per cent recently after an informal bid by Chiron of the US.

Aventis shares were off 1.1 per cent at EU58.

Additional reporting by Patrick Jenkins

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