AstraZeneca Annual Report and Form 20-F Information 2008

Sales and marketing ¹

Active in over 100 countries, we have an extensive sales and marketing network focused on growing our business and driving the levels of commercial excellence that will maintain our position among the industry world leaders.

Our Global Marketing (GM) function is responsible for developing and leading our global brand strategy, to ensure strong customer focus and commercial direction in the management of our R&D and brand development activity, across the full range of pipeline and marketed products.

We define at an early stage of the drug discovery process what we believe the profile of a medicine needs to be to work most effectively in combating a particular disease. These disease target product profiles (TPPs) are based on the insights that GM gains through its relationships with healthcare professionals, patients and others for whom the medicine must add value, including regulators and payers. The attitudes and needs of these groups are key drivers of the development of the TPPs which are used throughout the life-cycle of a medicine to guide our R&D activity and help shape the therapy area and marketing strategies. Early in the development of new products, we also consider how best to demonstrate the value of our medicines to payers.

¹For the AstraZeneca definition of markets please see the Glossary section.