Aspen cuts sales workforce by nearly 90% in a month

Aspen Pharmacare presents a highly unusual workforce profile. Despite a total headcount of 2,737, the company has the lowest number of sales team, only 46, meaning just 1.7% of its employees are in commercial roles.

A reduction in business roles at Aspen, from 426 to 46 in the past month, is likely due to financial challenges, including the recent loss of a manufacturing contract and export regulations, which led to a notice to fire over 900 staff, an issue still under discussion.

The manufacturing deal involving Aspen started in April 2025 with an unknown client. After the company warned profits from its manufacturing business could be $108 million lower than expected, its shares fell more than 30% the next day, wiping out over $1.19 billion of its market value.

The deal has since been settled, with the counterparty agreeing to pay Aspen $29.2 million before 1 December 2025, in full and final settlement of all claims. Following the announcement, Aspen’s shares rose more than 2%, although the stock remains under pressure from earlier losses that had seen it trade around $11.1 per share.

Despite the low business and sales staff at Aspen Pharmacare, the workforce is mature, with the highest average experience among its peers at 15.4 years and one of the longest tenures at 8.9 years. This indicates a stable and senior workforce. With the settlement of their manufacturing dispute, the sales hires might increase in the future from 1 person (2%) this month.

Novartis records a growth mismatch, reporting 10% (238) total staff expansion while its Sales & BD team shows 0% growth, with only two additional commercial staff. This suggests that workforce expansion is concentrated in other functions rather than commercial roles. The commercial team of 993 is one of the highest and ranks fourth after Sanofi at 1545, GSK at 1,284 and AstraZeneca at 1239.

AstraZeneca has the highest proportion of commercial staff at 52%, showing a sales-focused model within a mid-sized workforce of 2,398. Sanofi’s commercial team is larger in absolute terms (1,545), but only 36% of its 4,340 total staff, which reflects a balanced spread of production and marketing.

In percentage growth in sales staff, two companies clearly lead: Johnson & Johnson added 95 new hires, a 23% increase, and Pfizer added 117 staff, a 15% increase, reflecting aggressive commercial expansion. By contrast, Novartis (993 sales staff) shows almost no growth, with only 2 new hires and 0% increase, while Sanofi added only 18 staff, a 1% increase.

Companies with moderate total staff but high growth in business staff show that you do not need a large workforce to grow in business. 

Johnson & Johnson’s sales team totals 515 employees and it added 95 new hires over the past year, representing a 23% increase in its commercial workforce. Similarly, Pfizer’s team of 889 business staff grew by 117 people, a 15% increase.