Top 10 Regional Bank Companies To Own In Right Now

Top 10 Regional Bank Companies To Own In Right Now: Roche Holding AG (RHHBY)

Roche Holding AG is a Switzerland-based pharmaceuticals and diagnostics company. The Company belongs to the Roche Group that operates through numerous subsidiaries and associated companies located around the world. The Company's products and services cover every stage of the healthcare process, from identifying disease susceptibilities and testing for disease in at-risk populations to prevention, diagnosis, therapy and treatment monitoring. Roche operates through two divisions: Pharmaceuticals and Diagnostics. Within the Pharmaceuticals Division there are three sub-divisions: Roche Pharmaceuticals, Genentech and Chugai. The Company's Diagnostics Division includes five sub-divisions: Applied Science, Diabetes Care, Molecular Diagnostics, Tissue Diagnosis and Professional Diagnostics. Its activities are structured into six geographical segments: North America; Asia-Pacific; Western Europe; Latin America; Central and Eastern Europe, Middle East and Africa (CEMAI), and Jap an. In March 2009, the Company completed the acquisition of Genentech, Inc. In March 2010, the Company acquired assets from BioMicro Systems for all products associated with the Roche NimbleGen microarray workflow.

During the year ended December 31, 2008, the Company Pharmaceuticals Division marketing gained approvals for its rheumatoid arthritis medicine Actemra/RoActemra in Japan, Switzerland and the European Union. In 2008, the division initiated 12 new phase III projects in, including clinical trials of the compounds pertuzumab, for breast cancer; taspoglutide, for type two diabetes, and dalcetrapib, for cardiovascular risk reduction. As of December 31, 2008, the Pharmaceuticals Division filed 11 major new marketing applications and gained 13 major regulatory approvals. At the beginning of 2009, the division's research and develop! ment pipeline comprised 120 clinical projects, including 62 new molecular entities (NMEs) and 58 additional indications. Forty N MEs are in phase I, 16 in phase II and six in phase III or f! iled for regulatory review.

In 2008, Roche Pharmaceuticals signed a total of 57 new agreements including seven product transactions and 43 research and technology collaborations. In May 2008, Roche acquired Piramed Limited, a UK company with therapeutic research programmes targeting the PI3-kinase pathway in oncology and inflammatory disease. In June 2008, signed licensing agreement with ThromboGenics and BioInvent for their jointly developed anticancer agent TB-403 (R7334). In September, 2008, the Company acquired Mirus Bio Corporation active in the field of ribonucleic acid interference (RNAi) delivery and completed the acquisition of ARIUS Research Inc., which has a antibody platform that identifies and selects antibodies based on their functional ability to affect disease. S Research Inc. In January 2009, Roche acquired Memory Pharmaceuticals, which develops drug candidates for the treatment of debilitating central nervous system disorders such as Alzheimer 's disease and schizophrenia.

Pharmaceuticals

Within Pharmaceuticals division, the Company is engaged in the provision of drugs the areas of oncology, anemia, cardiovascular diseases, central nervous system, infectious diseases, inflammatory and autoimmune diseases, metabolic disorders, cancer, transplantation and virology. The products offered by Roche's Pharmaceuticals division include MabThera/Rituxan, Herceptin, Avastin, Tamiflu, CellCept, NeoRecormon, Epogin, Pegasys, Tarceva, Xeloda, Bonviva, Boniva, Lucentis, Tamiflu, Xolair, Valcyte, Cymevene, Xenical, Pulmozyme, Nutropin, Neutrogin, Rocephin, Activase, TNKase and Madopar. The products offered by the Pharmaceuticals division are sold in seven geographic regions: North America; Asia-Pacific; Western Europe; Latin America; Central and Eastern Europe, Middle! East and! Africa (CEMAI), and Japan.

Diagnostics

Roche's Diagnostics Division is a supplier of in vitro dia gnostics (IVDs). Its products are used to test body fluids a! nd tissue! samples to obtain information for the purpose of preventing, diagnosing, treating and monitoring disease. The Company has business areas five within the diagnostics division: Professional Diagnostics, Diabetes Care, Tissue Diagnostics, Molecular Diagnostics and Applied Science. Roche's Diagnostics division provides IVD services, including centralized laboratory testing and point-of-care diagnostics to molecular diagnostics and diabetes self management. In addition, it supplies research tools to life scientists.

Roche Professional Diagnostics supplies instrument systems, tests, software and services. It provides point-of-care testing products to support clinical decision-making close to the patient, in doctors' offices, emergency rooms and other primary and specialty care settings. Twelve Serum Work Area assays were rolled out during the year ended December 31, 2008, across Europe and in other markets. New assays included the Elecsys anti-TSH receptor antib ody assay for the diagnosis of Graves' disease the Elecsys anti-CCP antibody assay, a test to aid the diagnosis of rheumatoid arthritis, and the Roche Cystatin C clinical chemistry test for early detection of impaired kidney function, among others. Roche Diabetes Care's products portfolio covers the entire diabetes self-management spectrum, from glucose monitoring to insulin delivery, as well as monitoring systems with integrated lancets and test strips software for storing and analyzing data. Roche Tissue Diagnostics develops and manufactures medical diagnostic instruments and reagent systems that provide automation technology for use in the diagnosis and prognosis of cancer and infectious disease. In 2008 Roche Tissue Diagnostics launched ofhe Bench- Mark Ultra, a system that performs immunohistochemistry and in situ hybridisa! tion test! ing simultaneously on a single continuous and random access platform. Roche Molecular Diagnostics develops and commercializes diagnostic and blood screening platforms and tests based on Roche's ! real-time! polymerase chain reaction (PCR) technology. Applied Science business area supplies a specific reagents and test kits for use in life sciences encompassing biology, biotechnology ,medical research, as well as disease areas like cancer and virology. Applied Science's business area product portfolio includes such sequencing systems as LightCycler 480, LightCycler 480 II, GS FLX Titanium. In addition, Applied Science offers xCELLigence cell analyzer.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Leo Sun]

  In September 2013, Roche (NASDAQOTH: RHHBY  ) made an up-front payment of $10 million to Inovio, along with agreeing to milestone payments up to $412.5 million, for exclusive licenses on two vaccines -- INO-5150 for prostate cancer and INO-1800 for hepatitis B. The deal also entitled Inovio to double-digit tiered royalties on future sales of the products. But Roche ended the licensing agreement for INO-5150 in November, eliminating a large portion of those potential milestone and royalty payments. Roche will stick with INO-1800 and launch a phase 1/2a study in early 2015, but it could also walk away there if the results disappoint.

• [By Ben Levisohn]

  Shares of InterMune (ITMN) have jumped 36% to $73.40 after Roche (RHHBY) said it would buy the drug maker for $8.3 billion.

  Burger King Worldwide (BKW) has climbed 7.9% to $29.25 on reports that the hamburger joint is considering the purchase of Canadian coffee-outlet Tim Hortons (THI) for the tax benefits. Tim Hortons has gained 15% to $72.00.

• [By George Budwell]

  Reason No. 1
  Perhaps the biggest reason I think Puma is exciting at these levels is because PB272 is being studied in a diverse array of breast cancers, giving the company multiple shots on goal so to spea! k. It's n! o secret that breast cancer is one of the largest market opportunities in biopharma, boasting of one of the best-selling drugs ever in Roche's (NASDAQOTH: RHHBY  ) Herceptin.  

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