No­var­tis CEO Vas Narasimhan re­struc­tures the phar­ma gi­ant, cut­ting costs $1B+, oust­ing top ex­ecs and sig­nal­ing lay­offs ahead

No­var­tis CEO Vas Narasimhan has a plan to make the glob­al phar­ma gi­ant more prof­itable. And he’s start­ing by carv­ing out a bil­lion dol­lars-plus in costs in a move that sig­nals job cuts from the top team on down.

The cen­ter­piece in this re­struc­tur­ing in­volves the com­bi­na­tion of the phar­ma­ceu­ti­cals and on­col­o­gy busi­ness in­to one unit, dubbed the In­no­v­a­tive Med­i­cines group. The IM group will be di­vid­ed in­to two di­vi­sions cen­tered on the crit­i­cal US mar­ket and in­ter­na­tion­al ops. Marie-France Tschudin is trad­ing in her old ti­tle as head of No­var­tis Phar­ma­ceu­ti­cals to be­come pres­i­dent, In­no­v­a­tive Med­i­cines In­ter­na­tion­al and chief com­mer­cial of­fi­cer.

Unlock this article instantly by becoming a free subscriber.

You’ll get access to free articles each month, plus you can customize what newsletters get delivered to your inbox each week, including breaking news.

SIGN UP LOG IN BECOME A PREMIUM SUBSCRIBER