Roche on Thursday confirmed its full-year 2016 outlook on the strength of robust sales of cancer drugs including Tecentriq, the new immunotherapy that the Swiss company is banking on to counter patent expirations of its older medicines.
Third-quarter sales at the world's biggest maker of cancer drugs rose to 12.48 billion Swiss francs ($12.61 billion) from 11.9 billion francs in the same period in 2015, it said.
Analysts polled by Reuters had on average expected sales of 12.68 billion francs.
Roche said all of its recently launched medicines had performed well, with Tecentriq bringing in 77 million francs since its approval in May for bladder cancer. That revenue is now due to accelerate after US regulators this week gave the drug a green light to be used against lung cancer.
Nine-month sales rose 4 percent at constant exchange rates to 37.5 billion francs, shy of the average analyst estimate of 37.7 billion francs in a Reuters poll.