30 billion investment was handed over in Budapest, thus opening a new active ingredient production plant of Egis. Recently, the French parent company, Servier, established a twin plant in Normandy. What exactly will be produced in the new Hungarian unit?
The active ingredient of a drug used for venous diseases, which we have already produced, only with a different technology and in much smaller quantities. Previously, we were able to produce a fifth of the active ingredients for this medicine, as we will be able to do now with the establishment of the new plant, if the production runs up to the maximum. The newly opened factory unit will more than double our total active ingredient production capacity.
The active ingredient in question has been on the market for a long time, but in the new plant it will be produced with a new, more efficient production process, and the technology used is also more modern and environmentally friendly. The demand for the active ingredient has increased, which is served by the Normandy and Budapest plants together. Production has already started in Budapest, peak capacity is expected to be reached in 3 years. The new plant will employ a total of 80 people.
A plant of the Egis Pharmaceutical Factory
István Fazekas
In the past, many pharmaceutical manufacturers located their production in Asian countries for cost-effectiveness reasons, but Egis supplies the world market with three plants in Hungary (two in Budapest, one in Körmend).
This was a global trend for decades, but we were able to partially oppose it. The problem is not that the quality of the active ingredients coming from countries with lower costs is worse, but that the requirements of business operations are different. Certain laws are more relaxed, and this often accounts for a large part of the cost advantage of manufacturing companies in Asia.
This causes us a painful competitive disadvantage in Europe.
In addition, the vast majority of price systems in Europe on the market of subsidized medicines are aimed almost exclusively at price reduction, and this has led to brutal market concentration. All of this carries a risk of security of supply, which has now reached the point where there is a shortage of many medicines in Europe. This has been recognized by the EU, and there are initiatives that encourage at least the production of active ingredients for drugs classified as critical to be kept on the continent or brought back.
What medicines are currently in short supply? Are these on the EU’s so-called critical medicine list?
