Pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) has seen growth in sales and profits in the past three months, as the gradual recovery of the pandemic has led to increased sales of its vaccines in major markets.
The West London-based pharmaceutical giant revealed that in the second quarter of 2021, its turnover increased by 6% to £8.1 billion, and its operating profit increased by 23% to £2.1 billion.
As traditional hospitals and doctor appointments rebounded from the Covid-19 disruption, sales of meningitis vaccines increased by 46%, and sales of hepatitis and diphtheria vaccines increased by 28%.
The company’s vaccine division’s turnover increased by 39% during this period to 1.57 billion pounds.
Overall, sales of GlaxoSmithKline’s pharmaceutical business increased by 4%, while sales of consumer healthcare business fell by 3%.
The market welcomes this result because CEO Dame Emma Walmsley plans to split the company into these two components.
As investors digested the results, the share price of the FTSE 100 Index Group initially rose 1.5% to 1425.0 pence, and then fell back to around 1399 pence. Earnings per share were 28.1 pence, and the market generally expected 20 pence.
Walmsley, who wants to take the helm of the new vaccine department, said: “GSK performed well in the second quarter.
“We expect this positive momentum to continue into the second half of the year, pushing us towards a better end of the 2021 earnings guidance range and achieving meaningful performance improvements in 2022.
“We continue to strengthen our pipeline and are moving in the direction of separation.
“Our clear priority is to focus on execution, unleash the value of consumer healthcare, and achieve the tiered changes in GSK growth and performance that we are seeing now.”
A few weeks ago, activist investor Elliott called for a reorganization of the healthcare company and said that it should hire a new board of directors.
