Lundbeck retreats from dozens of markets, slashing staff
Lundbeck has announced a major change to its commercial strategy, withdrawing from 27 markets and handing day-to-day operations to partner companies.
The move – described as a "sharpening" of commercial strategy – will affect more than 600 workers in the affected countries who will lose their jobs but, according to Lundbeck, "are expected to have the opportunity to get a new job with the local partners." That figure is equivalent to more than 10% of Lundbeck's current workforce.
The partners are Swixx Group, Zuellig Pharma, and NewBridge Pharmaceuticals, who will be tasked with making sure that Lundbeck's medicines continue to be available in the 27 markets, which accounted for 12% of group revenues last year.
The handover – which will see the partners take responsibility for the sales, marketing, access, and distribution of Lundbeck's medicines – is due to be completed by the start of December. The company expects the transition to result in around DKK 390 million ($61 million) in costs this year with no impact on its 2025 guidance.
Swixx is taking control of 22 countries across the Americas, central and eastern Europe, as well as Russia and Turkiye, while Zuellig will handle Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, and Singapore, and NewBridge will take Saudi Arabia and United Arab Emirates.
That means Lundbeck is maintaining its presence in western Europe and the Nordics, plus Australia, Brazil, Canada, China and Hong Kong, Japan, Korea, and the US.
"This step is essential to building the commercial infrastructure that will sustain our long-term strategy and deepen our commitment to serving patients," commented Lundbeck's president and chief executive, Charl van Zyl.
"By reducing complexity and shifting resources to the markets and brands with the greatest growth potential, we are focusing capital to accelerate progress on our strategic priorities – most notably our growing late-stage pipeline in neuro-rare and neuro-specialty diseases," he added.
The move comes less than 12 months after van Zyl applauded his company's efforts to build a pipeline poised to four new molecular entities (NMEs) in phase 3 trials in 2026, fuelled by sales growth for on-market brands Rexulti (brexpiprazole) for agitation in Alzheimer's patients and Vyepti migraine therapy (eptinezumab).
Those four hopefuls are anti-alpha-synuclein antibody amlenetug for multiple system atrophy (MSA) – although, midstage data was a bit mixed – as well as anti-PACAP drug Lu AG09222 for migraine prevention, ACTH blocker Lu AG13909 for Cushing's disease and congenital adrenal hyperplasia, and 5-HT 2C receptor super-agonist bexicaserin for seizures associated with rare forms of epilepsy. Lundbeck acquired the latter when it bought Longboard Pharma last year for $2.6 billion.
