Macro Group for Medical and Pharmaceuticals aims to increase its market share by developing its business volume during the current year, by adding new products to increase its sales, or by acquiring investment opportunities that support the business model.
Ahmed Al-Nayeb, Chairman of Macro Group, said that the company aims to achieve a growth rate of 25% in sales during the current year, after achieving a growth in sales of 33% last year.
He added to Daily News Egypt that the company aims to reach EGP 1bn in sales this year, after its sales exceeded EGP 700m last year.
He added that the company seeks to seize a larger market share in the Egyptian market as its market share currently amounts to about 31% of the pharmaceutical market, which amounts to about 5 billion pounds, according to “Aquavia” research.
He explained that the increase in the market share will be achieved by adding new products to its list of products, which currently number more than 143 products.
He explained that the company is working on adding a product of “disinfectants” during the coming period, as part of its plan to introduce non-refined products in the Egyptian market.
He explained that the company’s products replace imports and compete with imported products in the Egyptian market, with high value and quality, and at balanced prices.
He pointed out that the company combines value and price by modernizing its machines, and is always looking for machines with a high production capacity to increase the quantity and reduce the cost, and has already recently replaced production lines for creams and some liquids in order to increase its production capacity.
He said that the company relies on its own resources to finance expansions, and has a good number of offering proceeds on the Egyptian Exchange.
Al-Nayeb said that Macro is studying a number of acquisition opportunities for companies that own new types of medicines, in addition to those types of technological platforms specialized in drug delivery.
He added that the future is for new technological platforms; Given its ability to facilitate the distribution of products to customers, this is what “Macro” is currently trying to target. It is studying an investment opportunity in an electronic platform for distributing products, but the studies are still in the preliminary stages.
He stressed that the criterion for choosing the companies to be acquired is that the new opportunity supports the company’s business model.
He said that the element of innovation in new products is the most important factor for facing the challenges of the pharmaceutical market in Egypt, especially as it suffers from duplication of products, and if new products are available for the first time, there is no doubt that they will attract a larger customer base, and this criterion is set by the company when choosing its new products; Because it strives to provide products for the first in the market.
Al-Nayeb indicated that the company exports its products to several countries in Africa, such as Sudan, Tanzania and Uganda, and seeks to open new markets in Saudi Arabia and Libya in 2023 through agents in those countries, and export represents about 5% of Macro’s revenues before the “Covid-19” crisis, then it fell to 2% due to the crisis, and is likely to rise again to represent 5% of total revenues during 2023.
Al-Nayeb added that opportunities are available for all sectors, as the effect of the import deficit includes almost all industries such as food, cars, and the medical and pharmaceutical sectors, and we must focus on the last sector to attract international manufacturers to be present and establish production lines in Egypt, which will provide the product locally, as well as transfer experiences in the global market for the Egyptian market.
He pointed out that the Egyptian market enjoys a high volume of demand, which is an opportunity for investors, but manufacturers were facing a crisis in providing raw materials that would enable them to manufacture sufficient quantities that keep pace with the high demand.
He explained that “Macro” adopts an investment policy to provide a stock of raw materials for the production process of up to about 6 months, which made the company replace the competitor in some items, but the import has stopped since March, and therefore its stock began to run out, in addition to the existence of a deficit in global raw materials. But the situation started to improve.
He expected high growth rates by the end of this year that exceed the normal rate, which represents about 30%, as the imported product used to acquire high shares of care products.
