Today, the US government announced that it's reached a $3 billion settlement with GSK regarding several long-standing investigations. We cooperated with the Department of Justice in these investigations and, in November 2011, announced an agreement in principle with the Government to conclude these investigations.
As of today, the final settlement is complete. Although the activities covered by this settlement largely occurred years ago, we must learn from the past. And we have. In my opinion, the picture of our company portrayed in these charges does NOT reflect who we are today. We've always been a good company--rooted in values. But the expectations of our industry--and the people who work in it--have changed.
In the last few years, we've publicly demonstrated--in our words and actions--who we are as a company. That we wish to live up to and exceed the expectations of those who watch us and work with us. Today, we are reaffirming our commitment to do just that.
We've changed the way we promote our products and work with our customers. Going forward we'll institute further changes, including greater standardization in our operations and additional compliance training. In fact, we started making changes before we were asked by the government, including compensating our sales representatives on the value they bring to their customers, not on sales targets. We're making our medicines and vaccines more available and affordable to people who need them, regardless of where they live or their ability to pay. These are just some of the ways we've changed the way we work to focus on bringing the right medicines to the right patients wherever they happen to be.
GSK is a company of 97,000 people who dedicate their lives to delivering quality medicines that benefit millions of people. Is there more we can do? Absolutely--and we're always looking to improve.
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