Investor Update

Basel, 6 Junly 2006

Roche re-launches Corporate Sustainability website

New content and format based on stakeholder feedback

Roche has revised and updated the Sustainability section on its global website, www.roche.com. The section is designed to provide a detailed overview of the company’s policies, activities and achievements in the areas of corporate responsibility, business ethics, access to healthcare, employees, health, safety and the environment.

First launched in December 2003, the Sustainability section gives access to a range of up-to-date information on sustainable development at Roche. In 2004 the Group also published its first Sustainability Report, based on guidelines issued by the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI). In 2006, the Sustainability Report was combined with the operational sections of the Annual Report to form the Roche Annual Report 2005: Business Report, reflecting the integral role of sustainability in the Group’s operations.

Among the new additions to the updated website are new good practice guidelines for working with patient groups. To comply with the Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry’s updated Code of Practice for the Pharmaceutical Industry, the website will also include a list of major patient organisations to which the company gives financial support. The revamped Sustainability section also includes a link to an independently hosted clinical trial protocol registry and results database that will eventually list all Roche-managed phase II to phase IV clinical trials; currently, over 250 Roche trials are listed (www.roche-trials.com).

A new Information and Service Centre in the Sustainability section provides a comprehensive overview of the standards Roche is committed to applying, the organisations of which the company is a member, the agreements it has signed, listing of all Roche corporate policies and guidelines, Roche’s ratings and membership in key sustainability indexes, and a list of prizes and awards it has received.

Roche and sustainable development  
Responsible, sustainable policies and practices are vital to Roche’s ability to achieve its business objectives. As an innovator in pharmaceuticals and diagnostics, the Group is making significant contributions to meeting today’s and tomorrow’s healthcare needs. But it also recognises that its operations have economic, social and environmental impacts on many different stakeholder groups, raising a wide range of issues and creating expectations that need to be addressed. The Group revised its Corporate Principles in 2003 to express more clearly and forcefully its commitment to good corporate governance, human rights, environmental stewardship and corporate citizenship. In that same year a high-level Corporate Sustainability Committee, reporting directly to Roche’s CEO, was established to assess and coordinate Group policies and activities relating to sustainability, including increasing the transparency of Roche’s activities in this area. These include pricing and patent policies designed to increase access to medicines in developing countries and capacity-building programmes to help these countries improve their healthcare infrastructures. Details can be found on the Roche website at http://www.roche.com/sustainability.htm


About Roche
Headquartered in Basel, Switzerland, Roche is one of the world’s leading research-focused healthcare groups in the fields of pharmaceuticals and diagnostics. As a supplier of innovative products and services for the early detection, prevention, diagnosis and treatment of disease, the Group contributes on a broad range of fronts to improving people’s health and quality of life. Roche is a world leader in diagnostics, the leading supplier of medicines for cancer and transplantation and a market leader in virology. In 2005 sales by the Pharmaceuticals Division totalled 27.3 billion Swiss francs, and the Diagnostics Division posted sales of 8.2 billion Swiss francs. Roche employs roughly 70,000 people in 150 countries and has R&D agreements and strategic alliances with numerous partners, including majority ownership interests in Genentech and Chugai. Additional information about the Roche Group is available on the Internet (www.roche.com).

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