The step affected no only pharmaceutical producers but also the entire pharmaceutical industry.
“The revenue of our retail pharmacy chain (Dona i.e.) stood at 460 million lei (EUR103 million) in the first half, and at RON414 million in the second half, about 10% lower than in the first due to drug price cut as of July 1, as decided by the authorities,” Eugen Banciu, founder and chairman of the Dona group told ZF.
“Dona’s 2015 revenue stood at RON874 million, up 13% on 2014.”
Banciu says the pharmacy chain saw remarkable growth in terms of number of customers, quantities and sales volumes. As a result, he expects Dona, which currently numbers 270 pharmacies, to do even better in the first half this year than in the same time in 2015, despite the minimum drug price still in place.
“We want to buy about 30 pharmacy licenses ever year and inaugurate them as Dona in the following six months. In 2015, we opened 18 new pharmacies and this year we have opened ten so far (until March 23, 2016 i.e.). We will open 20 to 25 more by yearend and our investment budget is RON27.8 million (which includes both licenses and investments in logistics i.e.).”
Dona also introduced a franchise system at the end of last year, which will allow it to increase the number of pharmacies in the network even further, Banciu said. (EUR1=RON4.4669)
(English version by Loredana Fratila-Cristescu)