Uniphar swoops to buy 15 pharmacies
PHARMACY wholesaler Uniphar has bought 15 pharmacies trading under the Allcare brand.
The seller is an entity called Inischem, in which Uniphar already holds a stake of just under 20pc according to the most recent Companies Registration Office filings.
Uniphar has been on the acquisition trail recently, buying the healthcare distribution business of the Sisk Group earlier this year. That business distributes products including cardiac and orthopaedic equipment.
Uniphar, which reportedly wants to float on the stock market next year, has said it wants to become “sectoral leader in the provision of outsourced and specialist services to manufacturers in the pharmaceutical and medical sector”.
Inischem’s liabilities exceeded its assets by more than €39m at the end of last year, but the company said it had the support of its major creditor and could continue to meet its liabilities as they fell due.
It said in its most recent accounts that price cuts introduced by the HSE had a negative impact on the business.
“The principal risk facing the group and the company is the adverse impact on turnover, margins and profitability to due to price cuts introduced by the HSE. Reference pricing introduced at the end of 2013 continues to have downward
pressure on turnover and gross profit,” state the accounts covering the year to the end of December 2017.
“The group will continue to work at lessening the impact of HSE cuts by managing its buying closely and controlling all overheads.
“We continue to believe that the pharmacy has an extremely important role to play in providing costeffective and high-quality primary healthcare to the public,” the latest accounts stated.