AstraZeneca PLC

Good morning to those joining from the UK and the US. Good afternoon to those in Central Europe. And good evening to those listening in Asia. Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to AstraZeneca's full year and Q4 2022 results conference call for investors and analysts. Before I hand the call over to AstraZeneca, I'd like to read the Safe Harbor statement. The company intends to utilize the Safe Harbor provisions of the United States Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Participants on this call may make forward-looking statements with respect to the operations and financial performance of AstraZeneca. Although we believe our expectations are based on reasonable assumptions, by their very nature, forward-looking statements involve risks and uncertainties and may be influenced by factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied by these forward-looking statements. Any forward-looking statements made on the call reflect the knowledge and information available at the time of this call. The company undertakes no obligation to update forward-looking statements. Please also carefully review the forward-looking statements disclaimer in the slide deck that accompanies this call. There will be an opportunity to ask questions after today's presentations. Please use the raise a hand feature to indicate you wish to ask a question at any time during the call. I must advise that this conference is being recorded today. And with that, I will now hand you over to the company.

Thank you, Operator, and good afternoon, everyone. I'm Andy Barnett, Head of Investor Relations at AstraZeneca, and I'm pleased to welcome you to AstraZeneca's fourth quarter and full year conference call for 2022. We will also present our guidance for 2023 on today's call. As usual, all materials presented are available on our website. Please advance to slide two. This slide contains our usual safe harbour statement where we're making comments on our performance using constant exchange rate or CER, core financial numbers and other non-GAAP measures. A non-GAAP to GAAP reconciliation is contained within our results announcement. Numbers are in million US dollars unless otherwise stated. Please advance to the next slide. This slide shows the agenda for today's call. Following our prepared remarks, we will open the side for questions. We will try to address as many questions as we can during the allotted time, although I would ask that participants limit the number of questions you ask to allow a fair chance for others to participate in the Q&A. As a reminder, to ask a question, please use the raise a hand function in Zoom. Alternatively, you can click the Q&A button and write your question online. Please advance to the next slide. And with that, Pascal, I'll hand over to you.

Thanks, Andy. And hello, everyone. Welcome to today's call. We can move to slide five. We delivered a strong 2022 performance, finishing the year with total revenue in EPS at the upper end of our guidance range, which I'm sure you will remember we upgraded twice during the year. We reported total revenue for the full year of $44.4 billion, which represents an increase of 25% at CER. Core EPS was $6.66, which is up 33% compared to the prior year. Our business fundamentals remain strong, supported by our diverse portfolio of products and also our broad geographic footprint. It is from this base of strengths that we are announcing our 2023 guidance. We expect core EPS to increase by a high single digit to low double digit percentage, Given that we anticipate a very substantial decline in demand for our COVID medicines in 2023, this guidance is clear evidence of the strength of the underlying business, as well as our commitment to delivering improved profitability. Please advance to slide 6. Excluding our COVID medicines, we now have 12 blockbuster medicines, And we've made remarkable progress in our pipeline over the year with eight positive phase three readouts and a record 34 regulatory approvals in key markets. Our pipeline momentum continues to build, and I'm pleased to tell you that we are planning to initiate more than 30 additional phase three studies in 2023. And we believe 10 of these trials have blockbuster potential. Here are just a few examples of phase three trials we are initiating based on promising data we saw in the year. In oncology, we are moving our next-generation oral SIRT chemisestrant into the adjuvant breast cancer setting, and we are progressing two bispecific antibodies into several new phase III trials. Following our proposed acquisition of Syncor, we intend to initiate a phase III trial of Baxrostat in hypertension. And lastly, we have an opportunity in rare diseases to raise the standard of care once again for patients with hypophosphatasia With Alexion 1850, our next generation has phosphatase alpha. Please advance to slide seven. In order to stay at the forefront of scientific innovation, we are also making strategic investments in new platforms and technologies that have potential to drive additional waves of innovation, with a few examples listed here. To date, we have not only been able to build a sizeable pipeline, but one with the potential to add significant value to patients and their treating physicians, as is clearly evident from the many accolades that our medicines received this past year. So as you can see, we are working on today. We are working on tomorrow, which is 2025 to 2030. And we're also working on the long term with those new investments in new technologies. Please advance to slide eight. Today we are announcing our ambition to launch at least 15 new medicines by the end of the decade, which will support our ambition to deliver industry-leading revenue growth over the long term. Looking first at 2023, we are confident that the strength of our underlying portfolio will enable us to outgrow expected revenue declines from our COVID-19 medicines. Over the mid-term, excluding the COVID medicines, we're on track to deliver on our previously stated ambition of low double-digit total revenue CAGR growth through 2025, which is expected to come from our existing medicines and new launches. When we look to the long term, we're on track to deliver industry-leading growth well beyond 2025. Underpinning this confidence is the strength of our commercial portfolio, but also the extensive pipeline we are developing. Additionally, while the portfolio has a relatively low exposure to loss of exclusivity compared to peers, we take a very proactive approach which starts many years in advance. As you can see here, we have three examples where follow-on medicines are being identified and files underway or being initiated. replace revenues that may be lost following the few patent expiries that are expected to occur before 2030 and of course the focus here is on fast cigar franchise management limpaza replacement with the papuan and the switch of sorry cells to ultramiris coupling the scale and promise of our pipeline with our strong track record of delivery and the gross outlook for our company is very exciting indeed importantly We also have a clear trajectory to reduce greenhouse gas emissions with targets that have been verified by the Science-Based Targets Initiative. And finally, we remain focused on our ambition to improve operating margins, as we stated before. And now we'll hand over to Aradna to take you through our financials and provide more insight into our 2003 guidance. Over to you, Aradna.