Johnson & Johnson (NYSE:JNJ) Q2 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

Joe Wolk: Thanks for the questions, Vamil. I’ll start with STELARA and then see if Erik can add anything from a legal perspective, and then we’ll hand it over to Joaquin for your question on the MARIPOSA study. With respect to STELARA this year, there won’t be a significant impact. As you can imagine, most of that business was contracted for the full-year about this time last year. So there really wasn’t any material impact. And our current assumption based on some of the agreements you read about similar to what we’ve said previously is that we wouldn’t expect anything before January 1, 2025. I don’t know, Erik, from a legal perspective, anything to add?

Erik Haas: Yes. Thanks, Joe. From a litigation perspective, I could say that no other biosimilar is better positioned in our view than Amgen or Alvotech would be. So we would not anticipate any other biosimilar having the opportunity or ability to enter the market before those two.

Joaquin Duato: Thank you. And with respect to MARIPOSA, nothing has changed. We — this is an event-driven study with a final analysis expected as we said by the end of 2023 with a potential to be presented at a major medical meeting in 2023. We remain excited about the potential of RYBREVANT in combination with lazertinib to become a new standard-of-care in first-line non-small cell lung cancer with EGFR mutations. And we are looking forward to be able to present these results in due time in a medical meeting potentially this year.

Operator: Thank you. Next question today is coming from Joanne Wuensch from Citibank. Your line is now live.

Joanne Wuensch: Good morning and thank you for taking the questions. I’m trying to think about two things as I look forward to, given the strength in the first half of the year in MedTech, does this create, in your opinion, a new base from which we grow from? Or are we going to be writing about difficult comps next year? And second of all, with Kenvue’s splitoff by within days or by the end of this year, I anticipate, how do we think about different investments in the MedTech and Pharmaceutical franchises either through pure R&D internally or externally? Thank you.

Joaquin Duato: So as I commented in the earlier question, we are pleased with the strength of our MedTech business in the first-half of the year with 8% growth. We — this is driven by market growth, which we believe it’s also slightly elevated this year due to the clearing of the COVID-19 backlog. And at the same time, as I commented to our improved commercial execution and the introduction of new products. Of note, of our $12 billion platforms in MedTech, all of them have grown during the first-half of the year. And we are being quite successful in introducing some important new products in all segments of our business. For example, if I start with electrophysiology, that grew north of 25% in the quarter. We have introduced a new mapping catheter OCTARAY and also a new treatment catheter QDOT, which, as you know, Joanne, we presented results about QDOT.

So we increased efficacy and procedure efficiency, too. If we move into Vision, we are in the middle of the launch of ACUVUE OASYS MAX, which is doing well and also the launch of our TECNIS Eyhance, the first mono-focal intraocular lens, which is progressing also very well. Moving into Orthopaedics. The good news is that we have received CE Mark and CA Mark for our Robotic-Assisted System VELYS. And we continue to have an enhanced portfolio of knees and hips with our Cementless knees, the Medial Stabilized and in the area of hips with hip navigation and the recent addition of CUPTIMIZE and we see our market position there also progressing. And moving forward, we will continue to see good evolution also in Orthopaedics. Finally, in Surgery, we continue to enhance our endocutter and our energy portfolio with the launch of ENSEAL jaw curved and also with the launch of ECHELON 3000 in the stapler side.