The research-driven pharmaceutical company Boehringer Ingelheim Regional Center Vienna (RCV) can look back on another exceptionally successful financial year, in which operating performance[*] increased by 25 percent to 1,555.4 million euros (2016: 1,243.1 million euros).
Net Sales from the Prescription Medicines and Animal Health business areas in the entire RCV region rose by 20.8 percent to 837.5 million euros (2016: 693.1 million euros).
“Boehringer Ingelheim RCV considerably increased sales of prescription medicines compared with last year, in most countries by over 10 percent. The most successful countries remain Russia, Poland, and Austria,” said Philipp von Lattorff, Country Managing Director Boehringer Ingelheim RCV.
Strong sales increases in all business areas
The core business with prescription medicines developed positively, increasing by over 16.6 percent. In the first year since the takeover of Sanofi’s animal health sector Merial, business with veterinary drugs grew by 74.1 percent. Biopharmaceutical contract manufacturing also recorded two-digit growth.
Increase in staff in Austria
The number of employees in the region dropped by 4.8 percent to 3,302 (2016: 3,470). This is explained by the transfer of OTC business to Sanofi in exchange for Sanofi’s animal health business Merial.
In Austria the number of employees rose 3.7 percent from 1,629 in 2016 to 1,689 in 2017. This positive development is due to the recruitment of new employees for the production facility currently being built in Vienna.
Human pharmaceuticals as driving force behind growth
In the core business of prescription medicines, sales in the entire region increased 16.6 percent to 747.9 million euros (2016: 641.7 million euros). Russia, Poland, Austria, the Czech Republic, Israel, the Adriatic states, and Kazakhstan all recorded very positive developments.
Apart from the best-selling anticoagulant Pradaxa® and COPD medicine Spiriva®, the driving forces behind growth were the new drugs launched in the last few years: the diabetes medicines Jardiance® and Trajenta®, the lung cancer drugs Giotrif® and Vargatef®, Ovef® for idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, and Spiolto® for smoker’s lung (COPD).
In Austria revenue increased by 12.6 per cent to 94.0 million euros (2016: 83.5 million euros), with Spiriva®, Pradaxa®, and the diabetes drugs as the best-selling products.
Good results with animal health
Sales in the Animal Health business area increased by 74.1 percent compared with the previous year to 89.6 million euros (2016: 51.5 million euros), which is also due to the integration of the former Merial business. The most important products in the region were the pig vaccine Ingelvac Circoflex®, the poultry vaccines Vaxxitek® and Gallimune®, and our product portfolio for domestic animals, such as the antiparasitic Frontline®.
Start of construction of new biopharmaceutical production facility
Boehringer Ingelheim develops and manufactures biopharmaceuticals in Vienna both from its own research itself and on contract for other clients. In early 2017 the company started construction of a new biopharmaceutical production facility and associated infrastructure, which will become operational in 2021. It calls for an investment of almost 700 million euros and will create around 500 new jobs in Vienna by 2021.
“We will continue to focus on the rapid completion of our new production facility. In our existing production facilities we were nevertheless proud to be able to accept several new innovative customer projects in record time in 2017,” says Christian Eckermann, head of Biopharma Austria.
Cancer research center in Vienna
Boehringer Ingelheim aims to develop innovative therapies that offer as many cancer patients as possible a longer and more comfortable life. An international team of some 270 researchers analyzes the causes of malignant tumors and works on the development of new drugs to treat cancer.
“We cooperate with around seventy universities, research institutions, and biotech companies throughout the world so as to be able to offer cancer patients the best treatment options,” says Darryl McConnell, research head at Boehringer Ingelheim RCV.
With an annual research investment of 200 million euros, Boehringer Ingelheim is the most research-intensive pharmaceutical company in Austria.
About the Boehringer Ingelheim Regional Center Vienna
The Boehringer Ingelheim Regional Center Vienna is responsible for business with Boehringer Ingelheim’s prescription and animal health medicines in Austria and over thirty countries in Central and Eastern Europe, Central Asia, Switzerland, and Israel. Clinical research throughout the region is managed from Vienna, and it is the main center for cancer research in the Group and one of its biopharmaceutical research, development, and production sites. Boehringer Ingelheim is also active in basic research and is represented here by the Research Institute of Molecular Pathology (IMP) in Vienna. This makes Boehringer Ingelheim the most research-intensive pharmaceutical institutes in Austria.
Facts & Figures are available here.