Novartis AG Says U.S. Unit Subpoenaed

Novartis AG (NOVN), Europe’s biggest drugmaker by sales, said U.S. prosecutors are investigating the company’s marketing of products including the hypertension medicine Tekturna. A U.S. unit last year received a subpoena from federal prosecutors in Louisville, Kentucky, seeking documents on sales practices, including payments to health-care providers, for the drug and other medicines, Basel, Switzerland-based Novartis said yesterday in a regulatory filing. Sales expectations for Tekturna, approved by U.S. regulators in 2007 and called Rasilez overseas, were halved last year by Novartis after the company scrapped a test of the medicine among patients with diabetes because some had more strokes and kidney complications. Revenue from the drug declined 31 percent to $383 million in 2012, Novartis reported yesterday.