Below, I republish the section highlighting five significant industry trends affecting the U.S. drug wholesaling industry. I think Drug Channels readers will enjoy this summary.
Tomorrow, I'll be giving the keynote address at CBI's 11th Trade and Channel Strategies conference. Hope to see you there!
Bonus wholesaler trivia question: In 2010, which prominent drug wholesaler CEO wanted Donald Trump to run for President? (Answer below!)
FIVE INDUSTRY TRENDS FOR U.S. DRUG WHOLESALERS
(from Modern Distribution Management, November 2015)
1. Growing U.S. Outpatient Pharmaceutical Spending
Over the next 10 years, spending on prescription drugs sold through outpatient retail, mail and specialty pharmacies is projected to grow by $259.2 billion (+85%), to $564.8 billion in 2024. Wholesalers will benefit from the expected overall growth in demand for prescription pharmaceuticals and the corresponding increase in drug spending. See New CMS Forecast: Drug Spending Grows Along with Impossible Hospital and Doctor Spending.
2. Consolidation and Changes in Pharmacy Industry Market Structure
As the overall prescription market grows, we expect the pharmacy industry to continue consolidating and share to become more concentrated. Consolidation and acquisitions, however, generally hurt wholesalers’ margins, because the acquiring companies consolidate their buying power.
Larger chains, which provide much lower profit margins for wholesalers, keep growing faster than other market segments. They are winning the battle for retail prescriptions with new store openings, organic growth from larger and busier pharmacies, and acquisitions of regional chains. See 2014’s Winners and Losers: Prescription Market Share by Dispensing Format.
Significant recent transactions include:
- CVS Health announced that it will acquire Target’s pharmacy business and operate the pharmacies as a CVS-branded, store-within-a-store format. Target had operated almost 1,700 stores with pharmacies. See CVS Aims at Target: Deal Analysis and Marketplace Implications.
- CVS Health also entered the long-term care and assisted living market by acquiring Omnicare. See A Few Thoughts on the CVS Health-Omnicare Deal.
- UnitedHealth’s OptumRx acquired the pharmacy benefit manager Catamaran. Both companies operate large mail and specialty pharmacies. See OptumRx Sails Away with Catamaran: Deal Analysis and Industry Implications.
3. New Vertical Relationships with Large Retail Drugstores
Over the past few years, wholesalers have successfully deepened their relationships with large retail chains. Large pharmacy retailers are shifting from self-warehousing to establishing direct-store deliveries from a wholesaler. Here are the two most significant changes:
- In 2013, AmerisourceBergen took over distribution for the brand-name drugs that had been distributed from Walgreens’ own warehouse network and by another wholesaler. Beginning in 2014, ABC assumed responsibility for generic products that Walgreens had historically self-distributed.
- In 2014, McKesson took over direct-store delivery of brand-name and generic drugs for Rite Aid, which no longer distributes drugs from its own warehouses.
- Walgreens Boots Alliance (with AmerisourceBergen)
- The Red Oak joint venture between Cardinal Health and CVS Health
- McKesson’s OneStop generic program, which is now utilized by Rite Aid. In 2015, McKesson established McKesson Global Procurement & Sourcing Limited, a London-based subsidiary focused on manufacturer negotiations.
In addition, new vertical ownership relationships are also developing. Walgreens Boots Alliance can own up to 30% of AmerisourceBergen’s equity and will have two board positions. See Why Walgreens Boots Alliance is Triggering a Huge AmerisourceBergen Stock Buyback.
4. The Promise and Peril of Specialty Drugs
Revenues in the pharmaceutical industry will shift from traditional brand-name drugs to specialty drugs over the next few years. (See Pharma’s Bright Future: Meet The Top 10 Drugs of 2020.) To compete for the specialty drug opportunity, each wholesaler operates subsidiaries that focus on specialty drug distribution and related services.
Payer strategies, however, create profitability risks for the pharmacy-dispensed specialty drugs that wholesalers sell. That’s because these specialty product sales are being shifted into the largest specialty pharmacies (and wholesalers’ largest customers) with the smallest margins for wholesalers. See Why Blockbuster Hepatitis C Drugs Are Squeezing McKesson’s Profits.
5. The Changing Generic Marketplace
Generic drugs now dominate U.S. prescription activity. Wholesalers benefit from this trend, since a majority of their gross profits comes from generic drugs.
Wholesalers have benefited from the unexpected and somewhat unprecedented increase in the prices of some generic drugs. (See Winners and Losers from Generic Drug Inflation.) However, our analyses of pharmacy acquisition costs indicate that generic inflation was greatest in 2013 and 2014, and appears to have eased in 2015. See The Retail Generic Drug Inflation Slowdown: It’s Real.
Pressure on pharmacy profits from generic drugs is increasing, which will indirectly affect wholesalers that supply pharmacies. These challenges include a retail generic price war, the growth of narrow pharmacy networks, and new pharmacy reimbursement methods.
ANSWER TO TODAY'S TRIVIA QUESTION
For more on Mr. Rahr's infamous post-Kinray career, see this classic Drug Channels post: A Tale of Two Wholesaler CEOs.
No comments:
Post a Comment