Lotus Pharmaceutical Co (美時化學製藥), one of the nation’s leading specialty generic drug developers, yesterday said revenue last year hit a record NT$10.58 billion (US$371.4 million) on the back of robust exports.
Revenue last year rose 15 percent annually, despite plummeting 41.7 percent last month to NT$1.01 billion, which could be attributed to a high comparison base in 2019 due to higher sales of gSuboxone, a company official said by telephone.
GSuboxone is the generic version of Indivior Inc’s Suboxone used in the treatment of opioid use disorder, company data showed.
“Although falling annually, December’s revenue still stood at a comparatively high level. It was the fifth month with revenue of more than NT$1 billion last year,” Lotus Pharmaceutical director of corporate finance and investor relations Angela Luan (欒君儀) said.
The company’s exports grew steadily last quarter, albeit at a lower rate than the annual rise of 192 percent in the third quarter, driven by sales of oncology products and gSuboxone, and licensing fees, Luan said.
“Overall, exports made up more than 35 percent of our total revenue last year, hitting a new high. Strong sales of gSuboxone played an important role as we steadily seized a market share of 35 percent in the US,” she said.
As the price of its generic drug is more competitive than the branded drug, many physicians have prescribed gSuboxone to their patients, which boosted the drug’s market position, Luan said.
The company’s sales of gSuboxone were not affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, as people with prescription from their doctors could buy the drug at pharmacies, she said.
Lotus Pharmaceutical’s two markets in East Asia — Taiwan and South Korea — reported decent annual growth in revenue in light of the addition of acquired or licensed-in brand products, Luan said.
New revenue streams from Southeast Asian countries, such as Thailand and Vietnam, contributed about 5 percent of total sales, she said.
Uncertainty over whether the pandemic would end this year and whether governments would tighten lockdowns continue to cloud the company’s outlook, as the distribution of some of its drugs would be affected if patients could not visit hospitals, Luan said.
Separately yesterday, Dr Wu Skincare Co (達爾膚生醫科技) reported revenue of NT$62.15 million for last month, up 3.6 percent year-on-year, while its full-year sales for last year slid 24.6 percent annually to NT$765 million, according to a regulatory filing.
The company attributed the annual decline to lower demand at its physical stores after the number of foreign tourists to Taiwan plummeted amid the pandemic.
The firm would focus on e-commerce operations to attract more local consumers, it said in a statement.
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) last week recorded an increase in the number of shareholders to the highest in almost eight months, despite its share price falling 3.38 percent from the previous week, Taiwan Stock Exchange data released on Saturday showed. As of Friday, TSMC had 1.88 million shareholders, the most since the week of April 25 and an increase of 31,870 from the previous week, the data showed. The number of shareholders jumped despite a drop of NT$50 (US$1.59), or 3.38 percent, in TSMC’s share price from a week earlier to NT$1,430, as investors took profits from their earlier gains
In a high-security Shenzhen laboratory, Chinese scientists have built what Washington has spent years trying to prevent: a prototype of a machine capable of producing the cutting-edge semiconductor chips that power artificial intelligence (AI), smartphones and weapons central to Western military dominance, Reuters has learned. Completed early this year and undergoing testing, the prototype fills nearly an entire factory floor. It was built by a team of former engineers from Dutch semiconductor giant ASML who reverse-engineered the company’s extreme ultraviolet lithography (EUV) machines, according to two people with knowledge of the project. EUV machines sit at the heart of a technological Cold
Taiwan’s long-term economic competitiveness will hinge not only on national champions like Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC, 台積電) but also on the widespread adoption of artificial intelligence (AI) and other emerging technologies, a US-based scholar has said. At a lecture in Taipei on Tuesday, Jeffrey Ding, assistant professor of political science at the George Washington University and author of "Technology and the Rise of Great Powers," argued that historical experience shows that general-purpose technologies (GPTs) — such as electricity, computers and now AI — shape long-term economic advantages through their diffusion across the broader economy. "What really matters is not who pioneers
TAIWAN VALUE CHAIN: Foxtron is to fully own Luxgen following the transaction and it plans to launch a new electric model, the Foxtron Bria, in Taiwan next year Yulon Motor Co (裕隆汽車) yesterday said that its board of directors approved the disposal of its electric vehicle (EV) unit, Luxgen Motor Co (納智捷汽車), to Foxtron Vehicle Technologies Co (鴻華先進) for NT$787.6 million (US$24.98 million). Foxtron, a half-half joint venture between Yulon affiliate Hua-Chuang Automobile Information Technical Center Co (華創車電) and Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密), expects to wrap up the deal in the first quarter of next year. Foxtron would fully own Luxgen following the transaction, including five car distributing companies, outlets and all employees. The deal is subject to the approval of the Fair Trade Commission, Foxtron said. “Foxtron will be
RSS