Bayer is positive about the coming years. "We see good perspectives for our businesses in the medium term. In our so-called life science areas -- healthcare and crop science -- we anticipate further increases in sales and margins through 2014," said chief executive Marijn Dekkers.
At Bayer's healthcare division, sales were expected to reach "approximately 20 billion euros (US$26 billion) in 2014" from 17.169 billion euros last year.
The crop science division would raise sales to "more than 8.0 billion euros (US$10.5 billion)" in 2014 from 7.255 billion euros in 2011.
"The main reason why I'm optimistic for our healthcare subgroup is our well-stocked development pipeline in pharmaceuticals," Dekkers told an investor conference.
"We believe four of our medicines in late-stage development have blockbuster potential. That means each of these products could achieve peak annual sales of 1.0 billion or more." The four products are the anti-coagulant Xarelto, the eye medicine VEGF Trap-Eye, and the cancer drugs Alpharadin and regorafenib.
"We believe Xarelto alone to have a peak sales potential of more than 2.0 billion euros," Dekkers said.
As reported last month, Bayer lifted net profit by 90% to 2.47 billion euros (US$3.2 bilion) in 2011 on a 4.1% increase in sales to 36.528 billion euros.
Copyright Agence France-Presse, 2012
