2 months ago
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Cargo that should have materialised in April but did not arrive until May impacted sales and profit at Indies Pharma Jamaica Limited.
For the second quarter ended April, profit dipped by nine per cent to just under $64 million, while revenue fell by one-tenth to $270 million.
CEO Dr Guna Muppuri said the pharmaceutical distribution company experienced a stockout of one of its best-selling drugs which he declined to name.
“Some of the shipments got delayed and what used to come in six weeks became almost eight to 10 weeks for arrivals and some of the items went out of stock because of the transit issues,” said Muppuri.
“Those goods came after the quarter finished,” he said.
Meanwhile, Indies Pharma, which recently received approval for the Regadenoson Injection, to distribute it as a generic drug, is in the process of getting the product to market.
The company has entered into a deal for the production of Regadenoson in India, but is also facing delays, including late payment of advances to the production facility located in the Punjab region as well as the border skirmishes between Pakistan and India.
“The production facility is within 200 kilometres range from the missiles and everything. So that also made us wait to initiate the production process. Luckily, we have survived that. Within a few days, the war ended,” Muppuri said.
The advance has since been paid over and production of the drug is under way, with the first production run projected to last 120-150 days.
“So that means we’re going to see” the drug going to market “in the last quarter,” he added.
As a contingency, Indies Pharma has stuck up a relationship with a United States-based pharmaceutical manufacturer. Muppuri says his company was fortunate that the husband and wife owners of the unnamed company were long-time countrymen who now reside in the US.
Given given the uncertainty of tariffs and trade relations, it may be prudent to have a production facility in the US to shave shipping costs and skirt trade uncertainty, he reasoned.
Muppuri remains optimistic about the rest of the financial year.
He estimates that the second quarter delays cost the company about $100 million in lost business. The sales from the late flow of products are expected to buttress company’s performance in the third and fourth quarters, which are usually the two weaker periods in the company’s financial year, Muppuri said.
English (US) ·