AstraZeneca Annual Report and Form 20-F Information 2008

Biological products

We have a significant biologics business with proven end-to-end capabilities from discovery to commercialisation brought together in 2007 under the brand name of MedImmune. As is the case for small molecules, the discovery and development strategy for our biologics business is determined by the R&D Executive Committee, as is the funding allocation from the overall R&D budget.

We have around 30 biological product candidates in our development pipeline, backed by leading-edge technologies and R&D capabilities that cover a broad range of approaches to targeting disease across a range of therapy areas. These include antibodies, antibody derivatives, therapeutic proteins, peptides, RNA interference technologies and various types of live attenuated and sub-unit vaccines.

We also have a world-leading drug discovery platform, based on advanced technology for rapidly isolating human monoclonal antibodies using phage and ribosome display and a significant in-house manufacturing capacity and capability, including expertise in high-yield purification process and analytical development resources.

Our strategic objective is to generate eight compounds entering pre-clinical phase per year, on a steady-state basis, which we anticipate will translate into six new investigational drugs per year.