Research, Reports & Publications

Alexion Highlights Brighter Futures in 2019 CSR Report

Mar 30, 2020 3:00 PM ET

March 30, 2020 - Alexion Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ: ALXN), a global biopharmaceutical company focused on serving patients and families affected by rare diseases through the discovery, development and commercialization of life-changing medicines, releases its inaugural corporate social responsibility (CSR) report, Brighter Futures.

As this report focuses on 2019, it does not contain information about the company’s approach to the current COVID-19 pandemic. Information on Alexion’s response to this global health crisis can be found on its website. 

“At Alexion, we work to change lives for the better – ours, people living with rare diseases and the communities we serve – and our commitment to being a responsible corporate citizen helps make it possible,” said Ludwig Hantson, Ph.D., Chief Executive Officer of Alexion. 

The 2019 CSR Report is organized along Alexion’s CSR-STAR Platform, which sets forth the key principles of its comprehensive CSR approach: Serve Communities and Sustain Our Planet, Transform Patient Lives, Advance Our People and Our Company, and Redefine What It Means to Live With a Rare Disease. All of these principles are built upon a Foundation of Ethics and Compliance.

The report sets forth a set of aspirations that align with each focus area, along with metrics for measuring progress against each. These include:

Focus Area

Aspiration

Metric

SERVE Communities and Sustain Our Planet  

Make a positive impact in our communities

Increase year-over-year engagement in Global Day of Service, our primary employee volunteer event

Be responsible stewards of our shared environment

Reduce greenhouse gas emissions (absolute and intensity)

Increase amount of water recycled and reused

Maintain zero process waste-to-landfill enterprise-wide year over year

TRANSFORM Patient Lives

Support people affected by rare and devastating diseases and their caregivers throughout the patient journey

Increase the percentage of eligible patients who have been diagnosed with a disease that Alexion treats, that are included in Alexion patient support programs year over year, regardless of whether they are using our therapies

Ensure that, where possible, ongoing and new patient support programs have patient organizations involved in development, design and implementation

Generate real-world evidence to document the benefits and safety of Alexion treatments

Ensure that, where possible, Alexion seeks patients’ input on its rare disease registries regarding data collection, analysis and publication, and acknowledge patient authorship

Include patient and caregiver perspective, advice and input into early clinical development plans and identified Phase II/III Alexion clinical trials to inform protocols and where possible, patients’ informed consent documents

Be a key influencer of patient organization engagement standards across the industry through ongoing, proactive thought leadership

ADVANCE Our People and Our Company

Become the most rewarding company to work for

Implement key culture initiatives to drive patient-centricity year over year

Advance employee experience priorities to drive patient-centricity year over year

Create more patient-centric decision-making

REDEFINE What it Means to Live With a Rare Disease  

Advance healthcare through new therapies and innovative diagnostics

Accelerate diagnostics for rare disease patients by creating or optimizing new tests for the patient community, year over year

Pursue programs to bring novel therapies to patients, year over year

ETHICS & COMPLIANCE: Our Foundation

Build trust through ethics, quality and compliance

Be a key influencer of compliance standards across the industry through ongoing, proactive thought leadership

Alexion is already delivering on many of these aspirations, a sampling of which are highlighted below and in Brighter Futures.

Serve Communities and Sustain Our Planet:

  • 1,700+ employees donated 8,500+ hours as part of 2019 Global Day of Service.
  • Introduced eight hours of paid time off for qualified volunteer activities.
  • Refined charitable giving strategy along two avenues – Corporate Giving and the recently formed Alexion Charitable Foundation.
  • Maintained two LEED certified buildings, one in New Haven, Connecticut, and one in Boston, Massachusetts.
  • Achieved zero process waste-to-landfill status enterprise-wide.
  • Powered Ireland manufacturing facilities with 100% renewable electricity.

Transform Patient Lives:

  • Included patient input in 100% of international patient support programs initiated in 2019.
  • Created the enterprise-wide Patient and Stakeholder Value model to deepen understanding of the patient journey.
  • Delivered on patient expectations through the creation of Solutions To Accelerate Results (STAR) for patients – and the deployment of LEAP (which stands for Learn, Evolve, Activate and deliver for Patients).
  • Engaged patient organizations in its ALS and Wilson disease programs to learn the ways they suggest Alexion best work with their patient communities.

Advance Our People and Our Company:

  • Strengthened commitment to inclusion and belonging by instituting a policy stipulating that gender and ethnically diverse candidates must be included in the candidate pool for any open Board of Director positions.
  • Increased the number of women on its executive team to seven of 10 total members.
  • Saw a 34-point gain in employee Net Promoter Score in 2019, a measure of how likely one’s employees are to recommend the company as a great place to work.
  • Formalized CSR oversight through the Nominating and Corporate Governance Committee of the Board of Directors, and governance through the Executive Committee and a cross-functional Alexion CSR Steering Committee.
  • Awarded Biotech Company of the Year in Ireland at the Pharma Industry Awards.

Redefine What It Means to Live With a Rare Disease:

  • Formed a Diagnostics Center of Excellence.
  • Enabled the diagnosis of patients with a life-threatening disease through a collaboration with Genomics England on the 100,000 Genomes Project.
  • Collaborated with the Rady Children’s Institute for Genomic Medicine to dramatically speed diagnosis of rare diseases, which in 2018 helped the team set a Guinness World Record for fastest genomic-based diagnosis and turnaround of test results of a rare genetic disorder in a newborn.
  • Continued advancing programs in rare hematology, nephrology, neurology, metabolics and cardiology.

Ethics and Compliance, Our Foundation:

  • Launched the International Compliance Champions program to reinforce our foundation of ethics and compliance.
  • Directed 25% of total procurement spend on small and diverse businesses in 2019.
  • Achieved an 80-percentage point increase in our 2019 CPA-Zicklin Index score for corporate spending transparency and accountability.
  • Celebrated second Integrity Matters Week, dedicating a week to demonstrating how integrity underscores everything we do.
  • Presented at key events in support of our goal to be a key influencer of compliance standards across the industry.

Learn more by accessing the full Alexion 2019 CSR Report at csr.alexion.com.

Further information about Alexion can be found at www.alexion.com.

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Media Contact:

Megan Goulart, 857-338-8634

Senior Director, Corporate Communications

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