Pfizer 'to axe thousands of jobs'

The patents on some of Pfizer's best-selling drugs will soon run out

US drugs giant Pfizer is to announce 8,000 job losses when its new boss unveils his survival plan for the company on Monday, analysts believe.

One in three of Pfizer's 24,000 international sales staff could go in a restructuring drive to be unveiled by Jeffrey Kindler.

Plant closures are also believed to be on the agenda as Pfizer prepares for the expiry of crucial drug patents.

Pfizer announced an initial round of 2,200 job cuts in November last year.

Further reductions in costs were widely expected to follow this move and Wall St reacted coolly to the prospect of a renewed headcount cull.

Pfizer shares rose gently to $27.37 by midday in New York, a rise of 0.75%.

Mr Kindler expects to cut around $2bn ((£1bn;1.5bn euros) from Pfizer's costs as he embarks on a drastic pruning of the business.

Rival copies

The patents that protect some of the group's best-selling drugs have expired recently and the company is bracing itself for the patent expiry on its globally successful Lipitor anti-cholesterol pills.

As patents expire rivals can produce copies of a pharmaceutical's compounds and this usually sparks a drop in prices.

It takes years to bring a new drug to market, and complications discovered during research can kill off a prospective treatment after huge sums of money have been sunk into it.

Pfizer had pinned great hopes on Torcetrapib, a drug under development until side effects forced it to abandon the project late in 2006.

The prospect of losing patent protection on products such as its best-seller Lipitor, which could take place in 2010, threatens to deprive Pfizer of billions of dollars of income.

Mr Kindler became Pfizer chief executive in the middle of 2006 and named the group's chairman in December.