Sanofi-Aventis planning to launch 15 new products in Romania in 2010

2010-03-04

Sanofi-Aventis plans to introduce 15 new medicines to the Romanian pharmaceutical market in 2010, according to Dan Ivan, the head of the company’s operations in the country, quoted in The Capital. More than half of the new products will be OTC and generic drugs. The new products are expected to help Sanofi-Aventis to increase the volume of its sales and to maintain its revenues at the 2009 level at least, despite the unfavourable market conditions.
Last year the company’s revenues were affected by new regulations pertaining to the method of calculating the prices of imported drugs and by the devaluation of the Romanian lei. The company also expects the current year to be difficult because of clawback tax payments and the extension of the drug reimbursement period to 180 days. According to Dan Ivan, the Romanian subsidiary’s payments to the parent company for shipped drugs have to be made within 60 days, and the local branch has to resort to loans in lei in order to maintain the company’s operations. The loans lead to an additional cost of 6-10% for Sanofi-Aventis in Romania.
According to Cegedim, in 2009 Sanofi-Aventis and Zentiva earned sales revenues of RON 816m (€198m) between them: Sanofi-Aventis reported RON 529m (€128m) and Zentiva RON 287m (€70m). The two companies held a combined 15% share of the OTC market and a 9.7-9.8% share of the Rx market, in addition to a 7% share of the generic medicine arena in Romania.