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Santa Farma Serves Medicine for 75 Years

Santa Farma is one of the most deep-rooted companies in healthcare industry thanks to its impressive success record which has remained stable notwithstanding countless domestic and global economic crises for 75 years. We met Mr Erol Kiresepi, President of Santa Farma İlaç, to discuss the corporate history and targets of the company as well as the impact of pandemic on the industry.

Could you please summarize the journey of Santa Farma which has a 75-year history as of 2019?

The history of Santa Farma goes back to 1944 when my late father, Sami Kiresepi, founded ‘Farma Laboratory’. The Lab started by manufacturing pesticides, cough drops and syrup and other simple but widely used medicines.

The company took the name Santa Farma following its merger with ‘Santa Laboratory’ in 1946. The decision of the company to establish a manufacturing plant in 1953 marks its first step towards industrial manufacturing. The Company changed its name to Santa Farma İlaç Fabrikası Kolektif Şirketi in 1954 and Santa Farma İlaç Sanayi A.Ş. in 1973.

As years went by, we had to increase our capacity in order to respond to the market conditions and become a powerful actor in export markets. So, in 2015, we established Santa Farma Drug Manufacturing and R&D Centre which boasts of manufacturing 150 million boxes on a closed space of 44,000 m2 on a total land of 80,000 m2 at GEBKIM Organized Industrial Zone.

As it might be inferred from this chronological order, Santa Farma has always made new achievements notwithstanding several domestic and global economic crises which have erupted throughout its history.

What are the future product launch and investment targets of Santa Farma?

In 2019, we increased our turnover by 45 percent from 466 million to 677 million when compared to the previous year. Hence, we realized our vision to grow faster than market average as we were able to meet our sales targets for 2019 by more than 100 per cent. We operate in 11 distinct therapeutic categories including dermatology, nervous system and metabolism, gastroenterology and infection, and haematology with totally 73 products supplied to 50 different markets. We plan to launch new products for treatment of several chronic diseases including cardiology and diabetes in the next three years.

Recently, we have penetrated into the Over-The-Counter (OTC) product market with food supplements which are not classified as medicine. Considering this transformation supported by our new manufacturing and R&D plant, the establishment of Santa Farma OTC Division is sure to improve our position through different business models. With our 75 years’ experience and good record of reliable products appreciated by both doctors and pharmacists, we are ready to make new achievements in OTC thanks to high quality Santa Farma products which reflect the amazing teamwork of our successful Santa Farma employees.

What sort of lessons should the industry take from the “Pandemic”?

Well, we should focus on the entire healthcare industry rather than limiting this matter to pharmaceutical industry. In that respect, pharmaceutical industry is considered to be a strategic industry in the world. Its subject is “human and human health” while its object is “medicine”. It offers services to human beings from the prenatal period till death. It focuses on not only human beings but also all living beings including plants. This industry existed before history and it will be indispensably exist in the future, as well.

By the way, it should be noted that pharmaceutical companies are eventually economic enterprises and they remain subject to the same market conditions along with the other industrial companies. Therefore, they are not immune to the economic crisis caused by the pandemic. And yet, we are exceptional in that unlike other companies, we have to remain operational even if we do not make profits because of our obligation to serve the health of the society.

Covid-19 has obliged pharmaceutical companies to review their product ranges against a potential new pandemic. Pharmaceutical companies will inevitably increase their R&D investments from now on. Also, countries throughout the world have dramatically appreciated the importance of making medical materials and equipment accessible to all. This has also become a strategic investment field for the world

As the pandemic made us question the globalization, almost all countries including EU states tend to focus on nationalization as part of their socio-political agenda. Indeed, there are debates about repositioning industrial manufacturing centres within the borders of individual countries.

Nationalization may, on the other hand, give rise to increasing governmental control and intervention. This tendency has a grave importance in these days. That is because the fair distribution methods have already become a hot debate point in parallel with the progress on vaccination and treatment studies.

The basic message of pandemic is that we have to stop ruining ecological balance. On May 2, 2020, the World Health Organization confirmed that this is a virus of natural origin. This implies that there might be other viruses of natural origin. These are the last warnings to make us take responsibility for nature. All communities must take notice of this warning and take action accordingly.