Johnson & Johnson's (JNJ 0.41%) pharmaceuticals business in on pace to account for half of the company's sales, and it's a major source of the company's earnings. However, the company faces stiffening competition, and that's forcing J&J to respond with price cuts. Can J&J overcome those headwinds?
In this clip from The Motley Fool's Industry Focus: Healthcare podcast, analyst Kristine Harjes is joined by Todd Campbell to discuss what drugs did best and worst for J&J in Q1, and what could happen next in the segment.
A full transcript follows the video.
This video was recorded on April 19, 2017.
Kristine Harjes: The third and final segment of Johnson & Johnson, and the one that I think we would probably have the best time talking about, just because it's more along the lines of what we normally discuss, that would be the pharmaceutical segment, which is called Janssen. This one grew some 2% operationally in the first quarter. It is by far the most important part of this company. It's about 46% of total revenue. I can absolutely see it becoming over 50%, maybe even within the next year.
Todd Campbell: Yeah, this is also a big driver of their profitability. Just by making changes in how they do manufacturing, and staying pretty tight-fisted when it comes to spending, and because of the way the mix broke out between biologics and small molecules. Biologics are usually a little bit more margin-friendly. They were able to boost margins in their pharmaceutical units by 4%, 400 basis points. That's pretty extraordinary -- and pretty good. Top line, like you said, on a reported basis, the growth really wasn't that great. It was up 1%. Domestic sales were down slightly. International sales were up. There were some puts and some takes here as well. Some very strong-performing drugs, and some drugs, maybe, that investors should be keeping an eye on to see whether or not they find some footing, or see whether or not sales continue to decline.
