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Aventis: Building on a Base in Diabetes

 
• By Hazel Dawson

Aventis is looking to the diabetes market to boost future growth. Lantus, the company's novel once-a-day injectable insulin, will spearhead the move. But can Aventis use an injectable to break into the fast growing Type II segment?

Since its formation in 1999 following the merger of Hoechst and Rhône-Poulenc, Aventis SA has been fuelled by its top three drugs, anti-histamine fexofenadine (Allegra), cancer drug docetaxel (Taxotere) and anti-coagulant enoxaparin sodium (Lovenox). But it cannot rely on this trio forever—Allegra is under pressure in the US market from OTC and generic versions of best-selling anti-histamine loratidine (Claritin) and Lovenox sales have weakened of late, leaving only Taxotere's growth prospects intact. Thus, to maintain growth longer term, Aventis is sharpening its focus on rapidly growing disease areas such as diabetes.

Diabetes is a disease of glucose metabolism characterized by damagingly high blood glucose levels. Type I diabetics depend on injected...

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