The pharmaceutical companies of the Bel Paese are at the bottom of the European ranking based on profitability. And if they didn't export increasing shares of their products, their results would be even worse: in 2009, 54% of revenues came from exports; this year the average will rise between 56% and 57%. On the bench of the accused is the lack of competitiveness of "Sistema Italia". And that is that deadly gap between longer payment times by the public sector and lower prices on the domestic market compared to international competition that is bringing the entire sector to its knees. These are, in a nutshell, the results of a study conducted by Prometeia on behalf of Farmindustria on approximately 900 budgets of the EU15 in the period between 2002 and 2008. An alarming panorama, therefore.
All pharmaceutical companies with offices in Italy are affected by this situation, from nationally owned big companies such as Menarini, Chiesi, Sigma Tau and Recordati, to smaller companies without excluding the local offices of large multinationals. In fact, it is no coincidence that a couple of years ago a relevant group such as the American Pfizer abandoned the research center in Nerviano, near Milan, just as Merck fled from Pomezia (Rome) and Glaxo gave up its laboratories in the Veneto region.
To understand what has happened, it is enough to compare the European situation with the Italian one. Of course, in 2008 the 15-member Europe had a ROI (Return on investment, i.e. the return on invested capital) of 7.2%, equal to 8 tenths of a point less than in the early 2000s. Here, however, the situation was much more serious. The ROI of Italian pharmaceutical companies, in fact, dropped from 7.1% in 2002 to 5.9% in 2008 with a decrease of 17% against the 10% of the EU15. But that's not enough. «The negative differences for Italy», says the Prometeia research, «are amplified in terms of overall ROE (Return On Common Equity, the index that measures the profitability of equity) due to the higher tax burden in our country». In Italy, in fact, the average incidence of taxes on gross profit during the period 2002/2008 was 48.2% against 33.3% for the sample referring to the EU15.
According to the president of Farmindustria, Sergio Dompè, there are no doubts: the Prometeia study confirms the difficulties faced by the Italian industry in the sector due to responsibilities that are not its own. He says: «This is the result of a decade-long policy of bipartisan indifference towards us; today we are all paying the consequences: not only us but the entire Italian system of excellence in the health field".
He, Dompè underlines the loss of competitiveness and then explains the causes: «On the one hand, in addition to suffering delays in payments of 250/300 days by the public sector, we sell our products at significantly lower prices than the European average. Every 10 euros of medicines Fri
