It also doubled the capacity of the pharmaceutical warehouse to 12,000 square meters and rebranded 200 independent pharmacies out of 600 under the Alphega name.
Farmexpert plans to make investments in 2018, as well, its chief executive Iulian Trandafir told ZF, but they depend on the developments on the pharmaceutical market and on the legislative changes in the industry.
“We have something scheduled but is on hold for now because I don’t know what will happen. If the market moves in an acceptable direction, we will be able to start certain expansion projects, if it doesn’t, we’ll wait. We have everything calculated, put on paper, we only need to see the moment, because if we start the investment and something happens on the market, new regulations come up, it will be in vain, it will make no sense.”
Trandafir said the lack of predictability on the market is one of the obstacles, as the fiscal steps such as the split VAT were not clearly explained and their implementation was changed.
Farmexpert posted 2.8 billion lei (EUR611 million) revenue in calendar 2016, slightly up on the previous year, ranking second on the pharmaceutical wholesale market, after Mediplus and ahead of Fildas. Other rivals include Farmexim, Europharm and Pharmapharm. (EUR1=RON4.5841)
(English version by Loredana Fratila-Cristescu)