Company has prescription for growth
Pharmascience has ‘some very big ideas’ as it opens new Dorval distribution centre
“Rapid changes in provincial policies can have a drastic impact on margins and discourage future investment.”
PHARMASCIENCE INC. CEO DAVID GOODMAN
Family-owned Pharmascience Inc., Canada’s thirdbiggest generic drug maker, has put the final piece of a $41-million plant expansion program into full operation and is planning its next phase of growth.
The plant is a 156,000 -squarefoot, state-of-the-art distribution centre in Dorval that is the size of nine NHL rinks and equipped with digital wireless inventory control.
It will deliver a 15- to 20 per cent gain in efficiency and enable the company to maintain its leading 98 per cent service record.
While many Big Pharma companies were cutting back their Quebec and Canadian operations, Pharmascience saw more opportunities, said Morris Goodman, founder and family patriarch, at the centre’s official opening on Wednesday.
“Burgeoning public and private health care services could only boost demand for lower-cost drugs as many Big Pharma patents ran out,” he said. “That opened the path for generics, and in almost 31 years, Pharmascience has grown into a firm with more than $700 million in annual billings and 1,300 employees.”
Pharmascience, which also makes patented prescription and over-the-counter products, has two manufacturing plants, the biggest on Royalmount Ave. and the other on de l’Esplanade Ave. The recent expansion program boosted capacity and $4 million was invested to fully equip the new leased centre in Dorval.
“It’s the sole distribution point for all our 300 families of products available in 2,500 different formats,” said CEO David Goodman, elder brother of Jonathan Goodman, chairman of sister company Paladin Labs Inc.
“We ship to customers in Canada and 60 other countries, and in this highly competitive business you’d better have very smart transporta- tion logistics.”
Goodman said Pharmascience is planning six or seven years in advance as it maps future expansion in a world facing intense pressures for lower drug prices and in Canada-wide variations in provincial coverage policies.
“In Canada, we all produce similar high-quality drugs that have earned a great reputation worldwide, but the rapid changes in provincial polices can have a drastic impact on margins and discourage future investment,” he added.
Pharmascience has moved into basic research by buying Aegera Therapeutics, a specialist in cancer treatments. It sees new products flowing from the Aegera team’s work, Goodman said.
Do the Goodmans have ambitions to challenge Big Pharma one day? “To do big things you need a very big vision. … I can only say we have some very big ideas,” he said.