Merck & Co., Inc.

Q4 sales and earnings conference call. At this time, all participants are on a listen-only mode until the question and answer session of today's conference. At that time, to ask a question, press star one on your phone and record your name at the prompt. This call is being recorded. If you have any objections, you may disconnect at this time. I would now like to turn the call over to Ms. Peter Dannenbaum, Vice President Investor Relations, there you may begin.

Thank you and good morning. Welcome to Merck's fourth quarter 2022 conference call. Speaking on today's call will be Rob Davis, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Caroline Litchfield, Chief Financial Officer, and Dr. Dean Lee, President of Merck Research Labs. Before we get started, I'd like to point out a few items. You'll see that we have items in our gap results, such as acquisition-related charges, restructuring costs, and certain other items. You should note that we have excluded these from our non-GAAP results and provide a reconciliation in our press release. I would like to remind you that some of the statements that we make today may be considered forward-looking statements within the meaning of the safe harbor provision of the U.S. Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Such statements are made based on the current beliefs of Merck's management and are subject to significant risks and uncertainties. If our underlying assumptions prove inaccurate or uncertainties materialize, actual results may differ materially from those set forth in the forward-looking statements. Our SEC filings, including Item 1A and the 2021 10-K, identify certain risk factors and cautionary statements that could cause the company's actual results to differ materially from those projected in any of our forward-looking statements made this morning. Merck undertakes no obligation to publicly update any forward-looking statements. During today's call, a slide presentation will accompany our speaker's prepared remarks. The presentation, today's earnings release, as well as our SEC filings are all posted to the investor relations section of Merck's website. With that, I'd like to turn the call over to Rob.

Thanks, Peter. Good morning, and thank you for joining today's call. 2022 was an exceptional year for Merck. Our science-led strategy is working, and I couldn't be more proud of what our team has delivered scientifically, commercially, and operationally. We're focusing on what matters and keeping the patient at the center of everything we do. We made significant progress in 2022, advancing our broad pipeline with important internal success complemented by a portfolio of strategic acquisitions, collaborations, and partnerships. We've moved with speed and urgency to drive strong progress, and we've provided increased transparency into several of our long-term opportunities, including for Gardasil, for our cardiovascular pipeline, and more recently, for newer assets that leverage our leadership position in oncology. We enter 2023 with even greater confidence that we're creating a sustainable engine that will bring forth innovation and generate value for both patients and shareholders over the long term. Turning first to our results, the business is performing extremely well. The growth we've experienced in 2022 reflects the sustained track record of fundamental strength from our de-risk key growth pillars. We begin the year with confidence that we'll maintain the strong underlying growth after taking into account the significant impact Ledebrio had during the height of the pandemic last year and are pleased to reflect this in our 2023 initial guidance. Importantly, our pipeline is advancing with significant progress across several late-stage programs. In oncology, we have expansive research efforts, including our ambition to move treatment into earlier-stage settings where there is a higher potential for more favorable longer-term outcomes for patients. In December, along with our partner Moderna, we were pleased to announce highly encouraging Phase II results for our personalized mRNA therapeutic cancer vaccine in combination with Keytruda in the treatment of adjuvant melanoma. We're excited by the potential that this combination may have for patients across a range of tumor types. And last week, we were pleased to receive FDA approval for Keytruda for the treatment of certain patients with early-stage non-small cell lung cancer following resection and platinum-based chemotherapy which Caroline and Dean will speak to. In cardiovascular, we're exploring candidates across a broad range of diseases and have made substantial progress from just one year ago. At the American College of Cardiology Conference, we will present data from the STELLAR trial, evaluating Sirtatracept in pulmonary arterial hypertension, and from the Phase II trial of MK0616, our oral PCSK9 inhibitor, and we will also host an investor event to discuss these programs. In vaccines, Instituto Butantan in Brazil, with whom we are collaborating for vaccine development, reported very encouraging top-line results for their candidate to the prevention of dengue. These data will inform future development of our dengue vaccine, V181, and our efforts to address this critical public health challenge. Finally, through our business development efforts, we brought in four programs which will have phase three trial starts in 2023 and which have the opportunity to contribute meaningful growth during the latter half of this decade and into the next. We are following our disciplined approach to business development and will act when scientific opportunity and value align. We have more to do, but I feel very good about the progress we've made in 2022, and we believe that all of these efforts will lead to real benefits for patients and in turn, for shareholders. We enter 2023 with confidence in the innovation engine we are building and our ability to deliver sustainable value for patients well into the next decade. We will continue to execute on our de-risked assets and act with urgency to advance and grow our pipeline. We are doing all of this with an approach to sustainability that is closely aligned to our overall business strategy. I'm very confident in the short and long-term outlook of our company And I look forward to providing future updates. With that, I'll turn the call over to Caroline.