Grünenthal (company)

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Grünenthal GmbH

logo
legal form Limited Liability Company (GmbH)
founding 1946
Seat Aachen , GermanyGermanyGermany 
management Gabriel Baertschi ( CEO ),
Mark Fladrich ( CCO ),
Fabian Raschke ( CFO ),
Jan Adams ( CSO )
Number of employees approx. 4,700
sales 1.4 billion euros
Branch Pharmaceutical industry
Website www.grunenthal.de
Status: 2019

The Grünenthal GmbH is a 1946 in Stolberg (Rhineland.) Founded by German pharmaceutical company headquartered in Aachen , which is in the possession of the family of entrepreneurs Wirtz is. It was the first company to introduce penicillin onto the German market, the production of which had previously been prohibited in Germany by the Allied Control Council .

Grünenthal gained greater notoriety through the thalidomide scandal , caused by the active ingredient thalidomide in the sedative available over the counter as a sleeping pill in 1957 , which was withdrawn from use in 1961 due to serious side effects.

In addition to its two branches in Germany, the company has subsidiaries in Europe , Latin America and the United States and generates more than 50% of its sales with pain medication such as the active ingredients tramadol and tapentadol it has developed . Grünenthal is a member of the Association of Research-Based Pharmaceutical Manufacturers .

story

The Kupferhof Grünenthal , the parent company in Stolberg
Building in Aachen (2020)

The company that emerged from the soap factory Mäurer & Wirtz , founded by Andreas August Wirtz in Stolberg (Rhld.) In 1845 and relocated to the " Grünenthal " location from late 1888 to autumn 1889 , was renamed Chemie Grünenthal GmbH in Stolberg in 1946 by Hermann Wirtz (officially from his Mother Josephine Wirtz). On January 29, 1946, the company was entered in the Stolberg commercial register. The product range of the post-war years included disinfectants, cosmetics and herbal medicines. In July 1948, the managing director Jakob Chauvistré and his research director, the chemist and doctor Heinrich Mückter, began, with the production of "Grünetten" made from sugar and eucalyptus, which in August 1948 accounted for 63 percent of monthly sales. The company was later renamed Grünenthal GmbH and the headquarters moved to Aachen.

penicillin

Grünenthal GmbH was the first company to introduce penicillin on the West German market in the post-war period. (In the east it was Jenapharm ). The bankruptcy of the company, which was estimated to be almost certain, was prevented and the great demand for the urgently needed drug was met. Until then, the Allied Control Council had banned German companies from researching and manufacturing penicillin. The exact circumstances of how Heinrich Mückter came into possession of penicillin strains in the post-war years are still unclear. Grünenthal has so far not commented on this, but went in a commemorative publication on Mückters way from typhus -Experimenten the Institute for Typhus and Virus Research ofArmy High Command in Cracow to research antibiotics. The Ministry of Economics of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia stopped the production of penicillin by the Chemie Grünenthal company on February 23, 1948 on the basis of the development work carried out by the "Regional Research Office N. Rhine Westphalia, Research Branch Econ Sub-Commission" granted "Approval for an institute for scientific or technical research no. 10022 ”was approved.

Contergan

Grünenthal gained notoriety in connection with the manufacture of the sleeping aid Contergan, which triggered the Contergan scandal in the 1960s. The drug with the active ingredient thalidomide developed by Grünenthal, which was launched on the market in 1957, initially had little noticed effects on the adult nervous system. If taken in certain phases of pregnancy, malformations ( dysmelia ) were the result in newborns. These were initially incorrectly associated with the nuclear tests carried out at the time. The connection with Contergan was not known until the end of 1961 and the drug was withdrawn from the German market when the newspaper Welt am Sonntag1961 reported in an article about the possibility of damage to health from Contergan. The parents of the injured children who were still living at the time later reached a comparison with Grünenthal. According to estimates by experts , the drug Contergan sold by the Grünenthal company led to the death of around 2,000 children and serious deformities in more than 10,000 newborn children worldwide, around 5,000 of them in Germany.

In the USA, Contergan was denied approval, but it was distributed for testing purposes after the American manufacturer Richardson-Merrell first applied for approval in September 1960. U.S. FDA health officer in charge Frances Oldham Kelseydid not rely on the Richardson-Merrell Company, which did not include test results. Instead, only general statements from Grünenthal and the marketing department of Richardson-Merrell were given, and businessmen and politicians put pressure on Kelsey. She asked Richardson-Merrell to run tests and report the results. The company refused and requested a total of six new approvals, which were rejected each time. In 1962, Richardson-Merrell withdrew the application for approval. Nevertheless, a total of 17 children were born with thalidomide-related deformities.

In January 1968 the former laboratory manager Heinrich Mückter and other responsible employees of Grünenthal GmbH stood before the court. The trial ended in April 1970 with a dismissal for minor guilt on the part of the defendants and a lack of public interest in prosecution. This was seen by some as a judicial scandal . This is often countered by the fact that the animal experiments carried out beforehand did not reveal any teratogenic effects of the preparation, even with a high concentration of the agent. The discovery was delayed, among other things, because the public including the newly founded Federal Ministry of Health, among other things, a possible damageHad discussed nuclear weapons tests.

Between 1997 and 2008 Grünenthal refused to make any further payments by the company to the Contergan victims after the 110 million Marks paid into the Contergan Foundation by the manufacturer had been used up. At the end of 2007, the British entrepreneur Nicholas Dobrik and a group of victims were planning an international campaign to force billions in compensation. Dobrik had previously been against Diageo with the previous campaign, the successor company to the former British thalidomide licensee, was successful. Here, the victims are already granted a monthly allowance averaging 2,100 euros. On May 8, 2008, Grünenthal announced that it would voluntarily pay 50 million euros into the Contergan Foundation in order to help improve the living conditions of the Contergan victims over the long term.

In 2006 and 2007, the company came under fire because it wanted to prevent the broadcast of a two-part TV series called One Single Tablet by obtaining an injunction from the Hamburg District Court . The thalidomide process is dealt with in this film; the film was originally supposed to be shown on ARD in autumn 2006 . In the course of the further proceedings, the company's applications were repeatedly granted, as the television film mixed fiction with reality and did not correctly reproduce historical data. The society saw its personal rights violated and went before the Federal Constitutional Court. The victim lawyer Schulte-Hillen also sued the film. Ultimately, the distribution of 15 misrepresentations was prohibited and the film was broadcast on November 7th and 8th, 2007 by ARD and ORF2, with some, but not all, required changes.

As a result of the Contergan scandal, the Drugs Act in Germany was tightened and new test requirements for pharmaceuticals were created. In 1964, the Israeli doctor Jacob Sheskin discovered the beneficial effects of thalidomide in the treatment of leprosy . From the 1970s to 2003, Grünenthal sold thalidomide tablets to support leprosy hospitals in treating erythema nodosum leprosum . The release took place at the request of the World Health Organization (WHO).

Historical context and public reception

In the period from 1949 to 1953, essential conditions for the social integration of Nazi perpetrators were created in the Federal Republic of Germany . According to reports from the WAZ, from the 1950s onwards, among others, former Nazi chemists and physicians who were involved in human experiments in Nazi concentration camps were hired by the Grünenthal company ; in detail Otto Ambros , one of those responsible for the Auschwitz III concentration camp , SS Hauptsturmführer Heinz Baumkötter , advisor for the racial policy office of the NSDAP Martin Staemmler , as well as Hans Berger-Prinz andErnst Günther Schenck (1964–1971).

These personnel decisions subsequently led to numerous allegations and suspicions, which culminated in the process of coming to terms with the Contergansandal.

An example is a publication in Spiegel from February 2009:

“The spokesman for the approximately 450 British thalidomide victims claims that concentration camp doctors developed the fatal active ingredient thalidomide as an antidote to the nerve gas sarin in Auschwitz-Monowitz during the war. That emerges from a newly discovered document. [...] The drug manufacturer Grünenthal contradicts the suspicion that the thalidomide sleeping pill, launched in 1957, was developed in a Nazi concentration camp. "

These theses were never discussed in the legal context of the Contergan trial; and the mirror admits: "However, tests revealed that the document has little probative value."

A spokesman for the Grünenthal company said that the company had not yet opened its company archive for processing and saw no reason to shed light on connections to Nazi criminals, "because our company was only founded in the post-war period".

Further development

In 1979 Grünenthal developed the thrombolytic saruplase . In 1981 Grünenthal and the Japanese company Takeda founded a joint venture in Aachen .

Grünenthal later concentrated on active ingredients against pain and is active in this area with its own research and development. The active ingredient tramadol developed by Grünenthal was the most frequently prescribed opioid in Germany in 2009 . There are local business units abroad.

In 2010 Grünenthal invested 23% of sales in development and research. An example of Grünenthal's research is the abuse- aggravating formulation INTAC Technology , a galenic formulation of tablets that restricts the manipulation of products containing opioids and thus makes drug abuse more difficult.

In 2017, Grünenthal acquired the pharmaceutical start-up Adhesys Medical , which is researching a surgical wound adhesive. A year later, Grünenthal acquired the pain-related brands Nexium and Vimovo as well as the US rights to the pain patch Qutenza ( capsaicin ) and began to set up a US organization for the distribution of this product by Averitas Pharma .

In 2019, the company announced that it wanted to focus more strongly in its research and development and in the future to focus on areas such as peripheral neuropathic pain (PNP), chronic postoperative pain, chronic back pain and osteoarthritis.

Corporate structure

The company has several factories in Aachen and Stolberg as well as subsidiaries abroad. It sees itself as a family business. The sole shareholder is Grünenthal Pharma GmbH & Co. Kommanditgesellschaft based in Aachen, but its shares are held by 19 shareholders from the Wirtz family. They also own the Dalli-Werke , a Stolberg-based company that produces soap and detergents, and its perfumery subsidiary Mäurer & Wirtz . The manager magazin reported on February 14, 2005 that the turnover of the Wirtz group of companies in 2003, with around 7,000 employees, amounted to approx. 1.3 billion euros.

Grünenthal was run by the entrepreneur Hermann Wirtz until 1969 and then until 2005 a. a. Headed by his son Michael Wirtz , whose cousin, the chemist Franz A. Wirtz, was responsible for research and development as another managing partner. Then Michael's son Sebastian Wirtz became a partner and member of the management. From 1977 the pharmacologist Klaus-Michael Wilsmann (* 1943 in Bielefeld) was head of pharmacological research. From 1983 he headed the Medical and Scientific Information department. In November 2008 it was decided to appoint a chairman of the management and Sebastian Wirtz left the company management. Its chairman was Harald Stock in 2009, who previously worked for the US groupJohnson & Johnson had worked. Grünenthal parted ways with Harald Stock at the end of May 2013. His deputy, the chemist Eric-Paul Pâques (* 1954), who became Head of Research & Development in 1994 and became Chairman of the Group Management Board in July 2013, initially managed the business on a temporary basis. After Pâques retired at the end of 2016, a new managing director had to be found. This was found in Gabriel Baertschi, who was previously the head of AstraZeneca in Japan. Gabriel Baertschi has been Chief Executive Officer since October 2016 .

Locations

Grünenthal is not only in Germany (two locations), but also through companies in currently 26 countries, especially in Western Europe (e.g. Great Britain, Ireland, the Netherlands, Belgium, France, Spain, Portugal, Switzerland, Austria, Italy), Latin America (e.g. Mexico, Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Chile) and the USA. Further companies existed in Central and Eastern Europe (Poland, Czech Republic, Slovenia, Slovakia, Croatia, Russia) until 2011/2012. The business was sold to STADA . In 2018, just over 80% of sales were generated by the European and Latin American national organizations.

Production sites are in Germany, Italy, Switzerland, Ecuador and Chile.

The Germany division is Grünenthal's operational unit in Germany, based in Aachen - and structured in a similar way to a national organization. He takes on all tasks in marketing, medicine, sales, market access and services in Germany.

Products

The products include various analgesics based on the opioids tramadol ( Tramal , Zaldiar ), tapentadol ( Palexia ) and buprenorphine ( Transtec , Norspan ) and the local anesthetic lidocaine ( Versatis ). Introduced in 2010, Palexia is both an opioid analgesic and a selective norepinephrine reuptake inhibitorGrünenthal generates more than 50 percent of its sales with pain medication. Until 2010, contraceptive pills based on ethinylestradiol were also manufactured and marketed in Europe and Latin America . This division was sold to the Hungarian pharmaceutical company Gedeon Richter . Grünenthal continues to market the products in Latin America.

In 1959, Günther Sievers founded the company's in-house magazine, the waage (based on the company logo), as a sophisticated cultural magazine. In the meantime, the magazine, which was continued after Günther Sievers' death by his wife, Ingrid Sievers, has been discontinued.

engagement

In 1998, on the initiative of Michael Wirtz, the Grünenthal Foundation for Palliative Medicine was founded, with the help of which, among other things, the first chair for palliative medicine at RWTH Aachen University and at the same time the Clinic for Palliative Medicine at Aachen University Hospital were established, with Lukas Radbruch as its first director was called.

Since 2004, Grünenthal GmbH has been working with the EFIC (European Federation of Chapters of the International Association for the Study of Pain) to support young scientists in realizing innovative, clinical and experimental pain research projects. With a total of 200,000 euros, the EFIC Grünenthal Grant is one of the most highly endowed research awards in the field of pain. Individual grants of up to 40,000 euros are awarded for each project.

Grünenthal has been a participant in the German corporate initiative “ Diversity Charter ” since 2009 .

The company is also a founding member of the Association for Voluntary Self-Regulation for the Pharmaceutical Industry .

literature

  • 50 years of Grünenthal . In: The scales . Magazine of Grünenthal GmbH, Aachen. tape 35 , no. 2 , 1996, p. 45–88 (with contributions by Franz A. Wirtz , Klara van Eyll , Holger Kraneis, Klaus-Michael Wilsmann and Kai Zwingenberger, Eric Pâques, Franz Gerstheimer, Wolfgang A. Günzler and Burkard Weber and Peter Rotheudt).

Web links

Commons : Grünenthal (company)  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Company history. Grünenthal, accessed April 30, 2020 .
  2. ↑ Birte Schäffler: Grünenthal appoints Gabriel Baertschi as CEO. In: Healthcare Marketing. June 8, 2016, accessed April 30, 2020 .
  3. ↑ New COO for Grünenthal. In: Pharma Relations. September 1, 2017, accessed April 30, 2020 .
  4. ↑ Olivia Harder, Julia Schmitt: Grünenthal makes Head of Controlling CFO. In: Finance Magazin. January 23, 2019, accessed April 30, 2020 .
  5. ^ Grünenthal names Jan Adams as Chief Scientific Officer. In: The Pharma Letter. December 10, 2019, accessed April 30, 2020 .
  6. ↑ a b c d e company overview. Grünenthal, accessed April 30, 2020 .
  7. ↑ a b Grünenthal Report 2018/2019. (PDF) July 30, 2019, accessed April 30, 2020 .
  8. ↑ Company locations of the vfa members and their subsidiaries. Association of Research-Based Pharmaceutical Companies, accessed April 30, 2020 .
  9. ↑ a b Holger Kraneis: 50 years Grunenthal - Mushrooms, penicillin and pioneering spirit . A modern pharmaceutical company grew out of the post-war emergency aid. In: The scales . Magazine of Grünenthal GmbH, Aachen. tape 35 , no. 2 , 1996, p. 58, 61 .
  10. ↑ Klara van Eyll : 50 years Grünenthal - From the copper farm to pharmaceutical research . The Grünenthal farm and the Wirtz family. In: The scales . Magazine of Grünenthal GmbH, Aachen. tape 35 , no. 2 , 1996, p. 48-57 .
  11. ↑ a b Armin D. Steuer: The Contergan inventor. Brown prehistory. In: Der Spiegel. November 19, 2007, accessed April 30, 2020 .
  12. ↑ Linda Bren: Frances Oldham Kelsey: FDA Medical Reviewer Leaves Her Mark on History. (No longer available online.) In: FDA Consumer Magazine. US Food and Drug Administration, archived from the original January 18, 2009 ; accessed on April 30, 2020 (English).
  13. ↑ Klaus-Dieter Thomann: The Contergan catastrophe: The deceptive security of "hard" data. In: Deutsches Ärzteblatt . 2007 ( aerzteblatt.de [accessed on May 11, 2020]).
  14. ↑ a b Drugs scandal: Contergan company threatens to claim billions. In: Der Spiegel. November 10, 2007, accessed April 30, 2020 .
  15. ↑ Grünenthal GmbH: Grünenthal offers Contergan victims 50 million euros. The solution should improve the life situation of those affected. In: press box. May 8, 2008, accessed April 30, 2020 (press release).
  16. ↑ WDR two-parter. Federal Association of Thalidomide Victims, March 2007, accessed on April 30, 2020 (statement).
  17. ↑ Sven Siebenand: Thalidomide: Other indication, known risk. In: Pharmaceutical newspaper. November 13, 2007, accessed April 30, 2020 .
  18. ↑ Martina Janning: Contergan: Scandal with déjà vu effect . In: Pharmaceutical newspaper . No. 30 , 2011 ( pharmische-zeitung.de [accessed April 30, 2020]).
  19. ↑ Hayke Lanwert: How Nazi doctors got up at the Contergan company Grünenthal. In: The West. March 12, 2020, accessed April 30, 2020 .
  20. ^ Roger Williams: The Nazis and Thalidomide: The Worst Drug Scandal of All Time. In: Newsweek. October 9, 2012, accessed April 30, 2020 .
  21. ↑ a b Medicines: rumors about sleeping pills Contergan . In: Der Spiegel . No. 8 , February 16, 2009 ( spiegel.de [accessed April 30, 2020]).
  22. ↑ Ex-Nazis developed Contergan. In: The West. March 12, 2020, accessed April 30, 2020 .
  23. ↑ Franz A. Wirtz: Dear “waage” readers! In: the scales. Magazine of Grünenthal GmbH, Aachen. Volume 35, 1996, No. 2, pp. 45-47, here: p. 46.
  24. ^ Burkard Weber: 50 years Grünenthal - The common way in Germany . A successful German-Japanese joint venture: Grünenthal and Takeda Pharma. In: The scales . Magazine of Grünenthal GmbH, Aachen. tape 35 , no. 2 , 1996, p. 85-89 .
  25. ^ A b Siegfried Hofmann: Grünenthal relies on pain therapy. In: Handelsblatt. October 15, 2009, accessed October 27, 2011 .
  26. ↑ Annette Becker, Antje Freytag, Gerd Glaeske, Christian Luley, Reinhard Thoma, Stefanie Wobbe: Focus on pain: Analysis of the current supply situation . Ed .: German salaried health insurance company Hamburg. Medhochzwei Verlag, Heidelberg 2011, ISBN 978-3-86216-069-3 , p. 67/68 ( limited preview in Google Book search).
  27. ↑ Grünenthal GmbH: Annual financial statements 2010. September 26, 2011, accessed on April 30, 2020 (Aachen District Court, HRB 3546).
  28. ↑ Rolf Hohl: Start-up Adhesys Medical is taken over by Grünenthal. In: Aachener Zeitung. September 20, 2017, accessed April 30, 2020 .
  29. ↑ Grünenthal acquires rights to “Nexium” and “Vimovo”. In: Pharma Relations. October 30, 2018, accessed April 30, 2020 .
  30. ↑ pain: Grünenthal takes Qutenza. In: Apotheke Adhoc. November 8, 2018, accessed April 30, 2020 .
  31. ↑ Grünenthal acquires Averitas Pharma. In: M&A Review. November 16, 2018, accessed April 30, 2020 .
  32. ↑ Grünenthal realigns research activities. In: Pharma + Food. May 17, 2019, accessed April 30, 2020 .
  33. ↑ Our authors. In: the scales. Journal of Grünenthal GmbH, Aachen 35, 1996, 2, p. 89
  34. ↑ Eric Pâques . In: The scales . Magazine of Grünenthal GmbH, Aachen. tape 35 , no. 2 , 1996, p. 89 .
  35. ↑ Prof. Dr. Eric-Paul Pâques. (No longer available online.) Grünenthal, archived from the original on February 19, 2016 ; accessed on April 30, 2020 .
  36. ↑ Marion Gego: Grünenthal separates from managing director Stock. In: Aachener Nachrichten . May 29, 2013, accessed April 30, 2020 .
  37. ↑ Grünenthal GmbH: Grünenthal appoints Gabriel Baertschi as Chairman of the Group Management Board and CEO with effect from October 1, 2016. The Swiss-born Gabriel Baertschi will succeed Prof. Dr. Eric-Paul Pâques, who is retiring after 23 years with the company. In: press box. June 7, 2016, accessed April 30, 2020 (press release).
  38. ↑ STADA Arzneimittel AG: STADA and Grünenthal agree to purchase a branded product portfolio for the EU markets in Central Europe at a reduced purchase price. In: press box. January 27, 2012, accessed April 30, 2020 (press release).
  39. ↑ Grünenthal GmbH. In: Yellow List Pharmindex Online. Accessed April 30, 2020 .
  40. ^ Stefan Menzel, Siegfried Hofmann: Pharmaceutical company: Hungarians buy division from Grünenthal. November 3, 2010, accessed April 30, 2020 .
  41. ↑ Franz A. Wirtz: Dear “waage” readers! In: the scales. Magazine of Grünenthal GmbH, Aachen. Volume 35, 1996, No. 2, pp. 45-47.
  42. ↑ The scales. Grünenthal GmbH. In: Journal Database (ZDB). Retrieved April 30, 2020 (09 / 1970–49 / 2010).
  43. ^ The Grünenthal Foundation for Palliative Medicine. (PDF) For a decent life. (No longer available online.) Archived from the original on March 2, 2006 ; accessed on April 30, 2020 .
  44. ^ EFIC-Grünenthal Grant. European Pain Federation, accessed April 30, 2020 .
  45. ^ About the EGG. Accessed April 30, 2020 (English).
  46. ↑ Our members. Voluntary Self-Regulation for the Drug Industry (FSA), accessed April 30, 2020 .