To Our Shareholders

Throughout our annual report this year, you'll read about how Johnson & Johnson is bringing meaningful innovation to our patients and customers, and making a difference in their lives in a personal way—from Brunhilde Wecker, who made a full recovery from her stroke thanks to our new blood clot retrieval and removal device, to our own Bill Hait, an oncologist whose vision and insights helped accelerate the approval of a wholly new treatment for prostate cancer.

These stories remind us why health care is such a rewarding endeavor. They excite me about the future of Johnson & Johnson.

Over the past few years, we have navigated steadily through a series of significant challenges, keeping a long-term perspective, maintaining a disciplined approach to managing our investments for growth and our portfolio of broadly based businesses, and staying true to our operating model and values. We have turned the corner on a particularly difficult period.

In 2011, the year Johnson & Johnson celebrated its 125th anniversary, we returned to sales growth, launched a number of innovative new products to address unmet health care needs across the globe, and advanced our pipelines, which today are among the best in the industry.

We strengthened our product portfolios and leadership positions in many areas, including immunology, oncology, surgical devices and emerging markets. And we focused on scientific innovation to maintain or build share in other key growth markets.

We are delivering meaningful innovations in health care and building a more agile company to seize market opportunities. All the while, we've remained committed to Our Credo and the long-held values that have enabled us to succeed now for decades.

Though we continue to face difficult and uncertain macroeconomic conditions, our ongoing investments have us well positioned to grow and increase our market leadership in one of the most important and rewarding industries in the world while delivering sustainable growth for our shareholders.