Ratiopharm
| Ratiopharm GmbH
|
|
|---|---|
 |
|
| legal form | Company with limited liability |
| founding | 1973 |
| Seat |
Ulm , Germany
|
| management | Christoph Stoller (Managing Director) |
| Number of employees | 563 (annual average 2017) |
| sales | 690.7 million euros (2017) |
| Branch | Pharmaceutical Industry |
| Website | www.ratiopharm.de |
| As of December 31, 2017 | |
The Ratiopharm GmbH (proper spelling: ratiopharm ) is a German pharmaceutical company based in Ulm . Generics and over-the- counter drugs are offered on the German market under the drug brand Ratiopharm . The company has been part of the Israeli Teva group since 2010 .
activities
Under the drug brand Ratiopharm, patent-free pharmaceutical products (generics) and over-the-counter drugs are only offered in pharmacies in Germany . The product range covers almost all therapeutic areas. Ratiopharm is the generic market leader in the clinic market. Ratiopharm is known for its slogans “Good prices. Get well soon. ”And“ That's what ratiopharm is for ”.
history
The Ratiopharm GmbH was founded in 1973 by Adolf Merckle in Blaubeuren as a wholly owned subsidiary of Merckle founded GmbH. A milestone in the company's history was the introduction of the antibiotic Doxycycline -ratiopharm in 1979. The approval of the generic had to be fought for in court against the opposition of the original manufacturer. The court ruling created a decisive prerequisite for the future acceptance of generics in Germany. 1985 saw the introduction of the so-called OTC drugs , which are available in pharmacies without a prescription . The Ratiopharm International GmbH was founded in 1988, in 1993 the foundation was that of the sales generics specialized subsidiary AbZ-Pharma GmbH.
In 2000, Ratiopharm rose to become the leading supplier of generics in Europe. In the same year, the takeover of Canada's third largest generics manufacturer Technilab (now Ratiopharm Canada ) took place. In 2002, Ribosepharm was taken over by Fujisawa Pharmaceutical (oncology products). From 2003, Ratiopharm began a new television commercial that featured pairs of twins , among others. a. Folke and Gyde Schmidt with the slogan Good prices, get well soon from the advertising agency of Heye Group GmbH from Unterhaching. In 2004 the takeover of Magnafarma , the third largest Dutch generics manufacturer, took place. In the same year Ratiopharm was already present in 24 countries worldwide. In October 2005, the youngest development location was opened in Goa , India .
In August 2005, Philipp Daniel Merckle took over sole overall responsibility for the Ratiopharm Group worldwide. In autumn 2006 he founded the World in Balance foundation , which - in addition to his commitment to social projects - is an expression of his view of ethical entrepreneurship and responsible behavior. World in Balance was integrated into the group's public communication as a visible sign of social commitment until the end of 2008.
In March 2008, Ratiopharm announced that at the end of the month Philipp Daniel Merckle would withdraw from the operative business of the group and move to the group's advisory board . His successor was industrial engineer Oliver Windholz.
On January 5, 2009, company founder Adolf Merckle committed suicide because of the financial problems in his corporate empire.
In February 2009 it was decided to sell Ratiopharm in order to enable the restructuring of the Merckle Group. In mid-March 2010 the sale to Teva Pharmaceutical Industries for 3.6 billion euros was announced; the last competitors in the bidding contest for Ratiopharm were the pharmaceutical companies Pfizer and Actavis . On August 3, 2010, the takeover was approved subject to conditions by the EU Commission in accordance with the EU Merger Regulation .
Since June 2017 the company has been led by Christoph Stoller, General Manager of Teva Germany and Austria (European headquarters). He thus succeeded Markus Leyck Dieken, who was General Manager from October 2013 and moved to the Teva Group Management in June 2017. Previously, Sven Dethlefs, who accompanied the takeover of Ratiopharm by Teva in 2010, held the position for five years until he moved to the group management in Israel in 2013.
reception
In 2005, the pharmaceutical company was accused of systematically paying doctors money to give priority to Ratiopharm products. This is evidenced by e-mails, checks and internal documents that are available to Stern magazine . In order to increase its market share in prescribed drugs, Ratiopharm had paid doctors for the practice software Doc Expert, a software that preferred Ratiopharm products to doctors. Particularly cooperative doctors were regularly rewarded with so-called VOM checks (abbreviation for prescription management) amounting to 2.5% of the pharmacy sales price per drug. Payments to doctors were often disguised as lecturer fees or patient seminars. Up until 2003, a large part of the remuneration to doctors had also been given as gifts in kind, such as espresso machines, microwaves, etc.
On November 18, 2005, the owner representative Philipp Daniel Merckle announced the dismissal and immediate release of the chairman of the management, Claudio Albrecht, and the CFO Peter Prock; The background to this should be aggressive sales practices. Merckle, who had only recently taken over the management of the company and announced a new Christian ethos, told the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung : "In many ways, I hate the consequences of the previous leadership."
In December 2005, the Ulm Public Prosecutor closed the investigations resulting from this article on suspicion of breach of trust and fraud for legal reasons. In April 2006, the Stuttgart Public Prosecutor's Office corrected this decision and re-ordered an investigation against Ratiopharm on suspicion of aiding and abetting fraud and breach of trust. It should be examined whether the pharmaceutical company has got doctors with certain discounts to prescribe Ratiopharm products, even though they should have prescribed cheaper competing drugs. In November 2006, the Ratiopharm headquarters and eight private apartments of Ratiopharm employees were searched by the Tübingen State Police Department. In December 2006, the homes and business premises of almost 400 former and active sales representatives were searched. In 2009, the Ulm Public Prosecutor's Office passed the proceedings to the public prosecutor's offices across Germany based on the place of residence. As a result, some of the proceedings were discontinued because there was no financial loss.
On 30 October 2010, has Ulm District Court for the first time in Germany two practicing physicians group practice from the northern Alb-Donau-Kreis for bribery sentenced to imprisonment of one year on probation and a fine of 20,000 euros because within the period of Between 2002 and 2005 they received around 14 checks for a total of 19,180 euros from the drug manufacturer Ratiopharm. The doctors' lawyers appealed to the Ulm Regional Court . The Hamburg Regional Court also admitted an indictment by the public prosecutor's office before the large commercial criminal chamber. In this case, the doctor Reinhard B. from Hamburg-Altona and the Ratiopharm pharmaceutical representative Kerstin R. from Hamburg-Wandsbek are charged with bribery. The doctor received around 11,000 euros for prescribing Ratiopharm drugs for his patients in the period from February 2004 to August 2005.
On March 29, 2012, the Federal Court of Justice (BGH GSSt 2/11) ruled in the last instance in a fundamental decision that neither the employees of the pharmaceutical company nor the doctors had committed a criminal offense.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b Annual financial statements for the 2017 financial year of Ratiopharm GmbH. In: Bundesanzeiger , February 4, 2019, accessed on November 2, 2019.
- ↑ Twins in Commercials
- ↑ Page no longer available , search in web archives: press release of March 13, 2008 ( page no longer available , search in web archives ) Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ Ludwig Merckle: Quickly pay off the debt ( Memento from July 14, 2014 in the Internet Archive ). Südwestpresse from January 4, 2010.
- ↑ Press release of the EU Commission from August 3, 2010
- ^ Ratiopharm: The new boss at the Ulm location . In: Augsburger Allgemeine , June 22, 2017, accessed on January 9, 2018.
- ↑ Sven Dethlefs leaves Ratiopharm - Markus Leyck Dieken follows . In: Südwest Presse , August 27, 2013, accessed on January 9, 2018.
- ↑ Markus Grill: The Pharma Scandal. In: Stern . No. 46, November 10, 2005.
- ↑ prophet of cheap medicine . In: The time . June 24, 2007
- ↑ Ratiopharm boss Albrecht killed . In: FAZ . November 18, 2005.
- ↑ Markus Grill: Raid at Ratiopharm ( Memento from December 13, 2006 in the Internet Archive ) In: stern.de .
- ↑ Investigations against those responsible at ratiopharm lead to searches in nine properties. Press release from the Ulm Public Prosecutor's Office on November 7, 2006.
- ↑ Criminal investigation against “Ratiopharm Ärzte” discontinued . ( Page no longer available , search in web archives ) Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. In: kvportal.de .
- ↑ Money from pharmaceutical companies: Judge convicts doctors for the first time for bribery
- ↑ Hamburg public prosecutor's office - allegations of corruption against doctors in Hamburg - Hamburg - Hamburger Abendblatt (fee required)
- ^ Resolution of the Grand Senate for Criminal Matters of March 29, 2012
Coordinates: 48 ° 21 '39.9 " N , 9 ° 56" 19.9 " E