Bayer AG, Germany's largest company, reported first-quarter profit that beat analysts' estimates as top-selling drugs Xarelto and Eylea continued to soar.Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation, and excluding some costs, climbed 16 per cent to €3.40 billion, the Leverkusen, Germany-based company said in a statement on Tuesday.

Bayer's strategy head Werner Baumann will take the reins at the end of this month, succeeding CEO Marijn Dekkers. He's poised to inherit a company that Dekkers has reshaped through the acquisition of Merck and Co.'s over-the-counter medicines business in 2014 and by divesting a stake in Bayer's plastics unit, Covestro AG, through an initial public offering last year.Since Jan. 1, the company is organised under three divisions -- pharmaceuticals, consumer health and crop sciences -- increasing the pressure to develop new drugs.

Bayer also operates an animal health unit, which generates only 3 per cent of annual revenue. Baumann indicated recently that the company would either bolster those operations or consider a sale.Revenue last quarter only grew at the prescription drugs and animals-health divisions. Even Covestro declined. At €11.9 billion, sales overall fell just short of the €12.1 billion analysts had estimated. The company reiterated that it expected Ebitda before special items at its life sciences operations to grow by a mid-single-digit percentage this year.(Updates with sales by unit in last paragraph.)

Bloomberg