NEW YORK, Oct 13 (Reuters) – Thermo Fisher Scientific’s
(TMO.N: Quote, Profile, Research) size and broad line of businesses protect it from
unpredictable revenue swoons and from being too dependent on
any one customer base compared with its smaller rivals, its
chief executive told Reuters on Thursday.

Marc Casper, who heads the leading maker of scientific
instruments, environmental safety products and diagnostic
equipment, sees Thermo’s Asia business growing to about 20
percent of total revenue over the next five years.

Oct 12 (Reuters) – Wells Fargo & Co , one of the
largest U.S. employers, plans to cut costs by moving its
workers into insurance plans that encourage them to spend less
on healthcare.

The bank confirmed to Reuters that it’s rolling out a new
insurance plan next year that will give employees accounts to
help cover medical expenses. They can either put their own
pretax dollars in the accounts, or pay higher insurance
premiums and have the company fund the account.

By Bill Berkrot

(Reuters) – Speculation that New Jersey Governor Chris Christie will enter the presidential race has led to a feverish debate about the possibility of having the fattest man in the White House since the corpulent William Howard Taft squeezed behind the big desk in the Oval Office.

Of course Taft, who reportedly weighed nearly 340 pounds during his presidency, ran for the highest office in 1908 when there wasn’t the same focus on image and no need to worry about how a candidate looked on television.

By Bill Berkrot

(Reuters) – Speculation that New Jersey Governor Chris Christie will enter the presidential race has led to a feverish debate about the possibility of having the fattest man in the White House since the corpulent William Howard Taft squeezed behind the big desk in the Oval Office.

Of course Taft, who reportedly weighed nearly 340 pounds during his presidency, ran for the highest office in 1908 when there wasn’t the same focus on image and no need to worry about how a candidate looked on television.

By Bill Berkrot

(Reuters) – Speculation that New Jersey Governor Chris Christie will enter the U.S. presidential race has led to a feverish debate about the possibility of having the fattest man in the White House since the corpulent William Howard Taft squeezed behind the big desk in the Oval Office.

Of course Taft, who reportedly weighed nearly 340 pounds (154 kg) during his presidency, ran for the highest office in 1908 when there wasn’t the same focus on image and no need to worry about how a candidate looked on television.

NEW YORK (Reuters) – The Chief Executive of Bristol-Myers Squibb Co said the company intends to remain “100 percent” in prescription medicines and is prepared to use its $10 billion cash hoard to gain new drugs through moderate size deals with other drugmakers.

Lamberto Andreotti also told scores of industry executives and analysts that the company’s recently approved Yervoy medicine for metastatic melanoma continues to generate good initial sales.

Sept 21 (Reuters) – The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs
said it has stopped using Roche’s (ROG.VX: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) Avastin to treat a
sight-robbing eye disease as it looks into reports of increased
risk of infection.

Roche’s Lucentis is specifically approved to treat wet
age-related macular degeneration — the leading cause of
blindness in the elderly. But its multibillion-dollar a year
cancer drug Avastin, which works in a similar manner, is
increasingly being used off-label to treat the disease because
it costs a fraction of Lucentis when cut into the small doses
needed for the eye disease.

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Sanofi SA’s (SASY.PA: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) chief executive has already put his company’s patent expiration woes in the rear view mirror and believes that the French drugmaker and the pharmaceutical industry are undervalued.

“We’re not in a market that’s really looking at fundamentals right now. Personally, I think this is an industry that is getting ready for a re-rating,” Sanofi CEO Chris Viehbacher told Reuters in an interview in New York.

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Dendreon Corp said on Thursday it would cut 500 jobs as it seeks to trim expenses in light of diminished sales expectations for its high-priced Provenge prostate cancer vaccine.

The total employee-related cost of the restructuring is expected to be about $21 million, the company said, citing a need to align staffing “with the shift in the (Provenge) launch trajectory and meet the company’s manufacturing requirements.”

BOSTON/NEW YORK, Sept 8 (Reuters) – Dendreon Corp (DNDN.O: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz),
which makes the high-priced prostate cancer vaccine Provenge,
faces an uphill battle to win back investor confidence after
abruptly withdrawing its sales forecast for the drug last
month.

The company will discuss its future on a conference call
with investors after the market closes on Thursday and lay out
a restructuring plan that is expected to focus on cutting
manufacturing costs and boosting profit margins.