Sicomed Bucharest, the leading Romanian drugmaker, pursues a 10% sales growth in real terms from the $48 million in 2003 by doubling exports and by releasing new products.
The company also relies on the "consumers' tendency to shift to generic drugs" -Mirel Nicola, Sicomed's marketing and sales manager explains, and on the VAT cut down to 9%, set to make a positive impact on the entire drug market.
"The 10% sales growth will be mainly due to the new products Sicomed has recently launched or will release throughout 2004. As for exports, we rely on the sales growth on the Eastern European markets we have already surveyed and on tapping into the Western markets after securing the GMP International certification. We have two major edges we need to put to use on the European Union markets: the low costs and the very large production capacity for injectable drugs (one of largest in the entire Europe for that matter)," Mirel Nicola stated.
Sicomed had invested more than $10 million in obtaining the GMP (Good Manufacturing Practice) certification for its injectable drugs department until the end of last year. The company will soon complete a $5 million investment in obtaining the GMP certification for its tablet department and will take out an $8 million loan to complete the upgrade in 2004.
Sicomed accounts for 5.5% of the Romanian drug market and is the second-leading player after GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) Romania, whose market share amounts to 11.5%.
Mirel Nicola says the upward trend of Sicomed's sales, as well as that of most of the generic drug makers will be backed by the overall market trends.
"The generic drug producers are becoming increasingly important on both the domestic and the international market, due to their competitiveness. At the same time, the deregulation of the prices for non-prescription drugs operated last year will produce much more visible effects in 2004 and the upcoming drug VAT reduction to 9% could make quite a big impact on the entire market," Nicola specified.
Sicomed posted 187.68bn ROL ($5.6 million) net profit in the first nine months of the year, almost twice higher than in the same time last year. The profit outgrew sales by far, as the sales progressed by only 25% in nominal terms to 1,154bn ROL.
Sicomed's majority shareholder is a financial vehicle, Venoma Holdings, equally held by the Romanian Post-Privatisation Fund, investment company Global Finance and Greek drugmaker Galenica.
Sicomed's share capital amounts to 416bn ROL, divided into 1,000 ROL par value shares. The drugmaker's shares last traded at 3,650 ROL on the Bucharest Stock Exchange, which brings the market capitalisation of the company to $47 million.
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