The sales include the results of Ecofarmacia, a retail pharmacy chain Help Net took over in late 2019.
“The results of Help Net should include those of Ecofarmacia, a company Help Net acquired in 2019, through which we operated in pharmaceutical retail in 2020 but only merged with Help Net on April 1, 2021. Ecofarmacia was a standalone company in 2020, but already acquired by us whose pharmacies operated under the Help Net brand,” Help Net officials said.
Ecofarmacia posted RON89 million sales in 2020. The acquisition enabled Help Net to add 32 pharmacies to its network in Transylvania, where the regional chain operated. The competition watchdog in Romania greenlighted the deal in March 2020.
Adding the sales of Ecofarmacia before the merger, Help Net overshot the RON1 billion sales mark last year and climbed one place in the ranking of the leading pharmaceutical retailers in the country to third, overtaking Dona.
In all, Help Net has 413 retail pharmacies throughout the country. Help Net’s owner is Germany’s Phoenix group, which bought it along with pharmaceutical wholesaler Farmexim from its Romanian owners in 2018 in a deal ZF put at more than EUR100 million.
(English version by Loredana Fratila-Cristescu)