R&D spending share of top pharmaceutical companies 2019 and 2026

In 2019, pharmaceutical companies AstraZeneca and Eli Lilly spent about 23 and 28 percent of their prescription drug revenue on research and development, respectively. The companies are predicted to spend some four to five percent less of their revenues on R&D in 2026.

Global R&D spending

In 2019, the pharmaceutical industry spent 186 billion U.S. dollars on research and development, which is an increase of over five billion compared to the previous year. By 2026, expenditures are expected to reach a total of over 230 billion U.S. dollars. Some 17,700 prescription drugs were in the 2020 R&D pipeline, a global number that has been growing with each consecutive year. The drug count has doubled since 2006 and is set to increase even further in the future.

AstraZeneca

AstraZeneca is a British-Swedish multinational pharmaceutical company, based in Cambridge, United Kingdom. The company’s top product in 2019 was Symbicort, which is used for controlling and preventing symptoms of asthma. The product generated close to 2.5 billion U.S. dollars in revenue that year. Revenue earned through Symbicort has decreased each year since 2015.