NORTHERN PHARMA
THE HOME OF QUALITY MEDICINES AND COSMETICS
BUSINESS PLAN FOR 5 YEAR PERIOD 2013-2018
Table of Contents
IEC- Information Education and Communication
MeTA- Medicines Transparency Alliance
NDA- National Drug Authority
Executive Summary
Northern
Pharma’s three directors; Ladwar Okidi Denis, Opira Bishop and Eva Agnes Laker
Odongpiny hold all the company’s shares.
The directors bring a wealth of experience of over 20 years to the company from
the private and public pharmaceutical sector. Northern Pharma is a limited
liability company founded in February 2011 but started officially operating in
July 2011 at Plot 30 Awich road in Gulu.
The
Mission statement of Northern Pharma is to become the leading pharmacy
franchise in Northern Uganda providing quality branded and generic medicines to
people of all socioeconomic status. Initially operating from Gulu, Northern
Pharma is expected to rapidly expand its services to each and every district
within the Northern region districts within the next decade.
Northern
Pharma Limited currently supplies quality medicines, medical equipment, baby
care products and cosmetics in Northern Uganda. Northern Pharma intends to
expand to offer pharmacy diagnostic services in all our franchise branches
like; Body Mass Index measurement, Malaria tests, Blood Sugar tests, Blood
pressure measurement and pregnancy testing.
Northern
Pharma currently requires approximately 600 million UGX extra funding to
facilitate its expansion strategy to all the 15 Northern region districts.
These funding will go towards two major investment strategies; opening new
franchise branches in all districts in Northern region and conducting targeted
marketing to ensure business growth and sustainability. Northern pharma will
thus require innovative ways to raise capital to finance expansion which
include. Targeted strategies include increasing share holders capital,
obtaining loans from banks and getting more share holders as a means of raising
more capital.
Northern
Pharma however faces risks like; Losing touch with customers; Loss of clientele
to other providers and Quality of services diminishing with rapid growth which
its management should monitor.
History and Position to Date
Northern
Pharma, Limited is a pharmacy outlet dealing in quality human medicines,
medical equipments, cosmetics and baby care products. The business is located
at plot 30 Awich Road Gulu. Northern Pharma officially opened its doors to the
public in Jul 2011 and has since then provided the people of the greater Acholi
Sub region and Northern Sudan with Quality medicines accompanied with quality
pharmaceutical care provided by a team of experienced community pharmacists.
The Company’s Mission
The goal of Northern Pharma is to be the leading
pharmacy franchise in Northern Uganda providing quality Branded and Generic
Medicines to people of all socioeconomic status. Initially operating from Gulu,
Northern Pharma is expected to rapidly expand its services to each and every
district within the Northern region districts within the next decade.
Our dream
is to provide a completely professional pharmaceutical care service to the population
of Northern Uganda and its greater catchment.
Management Team and Key Personnel
Northern Pharma was cofounded by a team of three
experienced pharmacists; Denis Okidi Ladwar, Bishop Opira and Eva Agnes Laker
Odongpiny. The three founders form the strategic management team of Northern
Pharma. Northern Pharma Franchise outlets are expected to employ at least five
staff; a branch Pharmacist, branch accountant, a pharmaceutical technician and
two nurses to conduct the day to day running of the pharmacist.
Denis Okidi Ladwar is a Pharmacist with advanced
training in strategic Project Planning and Management and Public Health. Denis
has over six years experience in community pharmacy practice and supply chain
management in the public health sector. Denis
previously worked for the International Committee of the Red Cross and
Management Sciences for Health where his main roles were to provide technical
oversight in areas of medicines management, use and supply chain management.
Eva
and Bishop are both experienced pharmacists additional advanced qualifications
in clinical trial management and public health respectively. Eva and Bishop each
bring over five years of experience to Northern Pharma to form a solid and
robust team ready to propel the expansion strategy of the Northern pharma
Limited franchise enterprise
Services
Northern
Pharma Limited supplies quality medicines, medical equipment, baby care
products and cosmetics in Northern Uganda. Currently we have one outlet in Gulu
but intend to expand to each and every district in Northern.
Northern
Pharma intends to expand to offer pharmacy diagnostic services in all our
franchise branches like; Body Mass Index measurement, Malaria tests, Blood
Sugar tests, Blood pressure measurement and pregnancy testing.
Northern
Pharma Limited also anticipates an increased market share with increased
franchise numbers and therefore intends to begin a door to door delivery of
medicine and health supplies orders to hospitals, drug shops and clinics within
the region
Company History
In
July 2011 Northern Pharma Limited started operations at plot 30 Awich Road
Gulu. Over the year Northern Pharma has continued to improve its product range
to include various generic and branded medicines, medical equipments, baby care
products and cosmetics from India, Europe and the America’s. Sales Currently Northern Pharma limited has over 200
different brands of medicines, baby care products and cosmetics.
Quarterly
sales for the past five quarters since the inception of Northern Pharma are as
below.
Table 1: Northern Pharma Limited Performance
over the past five quarters ending September 2012
|
Quarter
|
*Jul-
Sep ‘11
|
Oct-
Dec’11
|
Jan-
Mar’12
|
Apr-
Jun’12
|
Jul-Sep’12
|
|
Sales
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Gross
Profit
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Net
Profit
|
|
|
|
|
|
*Not
a full Quarter
Business Structure and Legal Status
Northern
Pharma Limited is incorporated under the laws of Uganda as Limited Liability
Company. The company has authorized 1,000 shares, 400 of which are owned by
Ladwar Okidi Denis, 300 of which are owned by Opira Bishop and the remaining
300 shares being owned by Laker Eva Agnes Odongpiny. Currently the company is
in the process of increasing share values of directors to reflect the true
business growth that has occurred in the past one year.
Market Research
During
the current period of fairly good economic growth, Northern Pharma Limited can
capitalize on the many significant opportunities in the Pharmaceutical industry.
Economic and Social Factors
According
to MeTA access to medicines in Uganda is still quite poor with about 29% of the
population travelling for at least one hour to get to a primary care facility.
Only 47% of house households admit having obtained medicines from a public
facility during their last illness. With key medicines availability standing at
47.5% and only 75% of prescribed medicines being dispensed. There is need for
sustainable private sector involvement in improving access to health care and
pharmaceutical care in Uganda particularly in the rural areas. Northern Pharma
Limited will in its expansion strategy attempt to improve on access and
availability of quality pharmaceutical care in the rural areas of Northern
Uganda.
Competitive Environment
Currently
Northern Pharma has a competitive edge in attracting and retaining customers
due to the highly skilled staff providing high quality pharmaceutical services.
Northern Pharma’s main challenge at the moment is the multitude of service
providers within the pharmaceutical sector whose roles and scope of service
provision needs to be harmonized as a quality assurance measure. These entities
include clinics, drug shops, general merchandise shops, health centres and
hospitals.
Long-Term Opportunities
Northern
Pharma intends to expand into a full franchise business having outlets in every
district in Northern Uganda and associated drug shop outlets in the rural areas
of all Northern region districts. We also intend to start importing generic and
branded medicines from Europe, Asia and the America’s within the next five
years.
Market Description
Northern
Pharma Limited Business franchise intended market is the entire population of
Northern region comprising of Acholi and Lango sub regions currently totaling
to 15 administrative districts.
Market Opportunities
Findings
show that the majority of rural populations normally of low socioeconomic
status have poor access to pharmaceuticals despite their need for medicines due
to greater morbidity. The MeTA estimates that in Uganda:
·
65% of households
in the lowest socioeconomic quintile face monthly catastrophic expenditures on
medicines
·
51% of households
in the lowest socioeconomic quintile have a chronically ill member who requires
medicines but has no medicines at home.
Northern Pharma shall target the all
Northern districts but with emphasis to providing affordable pharmaceutical
care to the rural underserved population in the region.
Northern pharma is the only pharmacy at
the moment with a goal targeting the rural underserved population.
Competitive Advantages
Northern Pharma’s competitive edge lies in providing using high
cadre professionals like Pharmacists and Pharmacy technicians as opposed to
nurses in providing pharmaceutical care. This will maximize customer
satisfaction and thus retention.
Potential Future Competition
Northern
Pharma occupies a unique niche in private sector pharmaceutical service
delivery targeting the rural population which has not been the focus of the
pharmaceutical industry up to to date. Potential
future competition is anticipated from new business players in the industry also
targeting the rural population.
Business Strategy
Our
business strategy is to offer the highest possible quality of pharmaceutical
care to the population of Northern Uganda.
Customer Incentives
Our
strategies targeting the customer are aimed at attracting new customers and
retaining old new customers by using the
·
Quality pharmaceutical
care and customer care
·
Getting the right
location in all 15 districts of Northern region
·
Fair pricing of
medicines
Advertising and Marketing
Northern
Pharma shall carry out targeted marketing to accessible drug shops and health
facilities in the Northern region. Northern Pharma shall later in its expansion
strategy as ways of marketing provide credit facilities and deliver ordered
supplies direct to the facilities.
Targeted
advertising shall be made to Prescribers and dispensing staff of all health
facilities in the region to ensure knowledge of available supplies at Northern
Pharma for ease of referral of clients.
Operations
Premises
All
Northern Pharma franchise premises shall fully comply with the National Drug
Authority (NDA) standards for suitability of premises for a pharmacy business.
All premises shall additionally have enough storage space for future expansion
of business.
Choice of Location and Premises
We intend
to locate all our business premises in the centre of every business district we
are located in. Where possible all business premises shall have enough parking
space with wide pavement for on lookers to have liberty to see Northern Pharma
Products through the windows.
Hours of Operation
All
Northern pharma franchise branches shall open every day of the week from Monday
to Sunday 08:00 Hrs to 21:00 Hrs
Equipment
Northern
Pharma franchises shall all have a computerized inventory management system
with a printer to facilitate printing of invoices. Future expansion shall
include use of bar code scanning equipment to ease pricing of items in busy
urban branches.
Staffing
From
the outset all staff will have job descriptions, a career and training history file,
and a record of employee reviews.
New
staff will take the travel agency Psychometric Aptitude Test and then spend
time with each member of Northern Pharma team at the respective branch of
operation. All staff will undergo full product training
Performance Ratios
We
plan to move up our gross profit from 20%
in the year 2012 to 40% in the year 2013.
Break-Even
To break even we
will need a daily average turnover of at least 400,000 UGX. We feel confident that with the current growth
rate we can break even within the next 1-2 years.
Funds Required
We
plan to make two major investments in marketing & advertising and in
expanding the business franchise in all Northern region districts.
Targeted
Marketing & advertising is estimated to cost approximately 24 million per
year for the period 2013- 2018. Detailed budget of IEC materials and associated
costs in marketing is still work in process. Franchise development will cost Northern
Pharma approximately 600 million UGX within the five years. .
Funding Options
Northern Pharma intends to use three approached
to raise funds for marketing and expansion
- The current three directors will continue injecting an annual sum of 200million into Northern Pharma expansion portfolio
- Obtain bank loans to finance the expansion strategy
- Increase share holders to the company to generate capital from outside the current directors. This will only happen if the current directors fail to raise the required capital from within and using Bank loans
BUSINESS CONTROLS
Accounting System
We
will be using a computer-based financial management system. With this system we
can review our sales, marketing and growth on a regular basis. This will allow
us to analyze the profitability of operations.
Quality Control
Quality
control will be carried out using a two phase approach:
·
Purchasing medicines
and cosmetics from the authorized suppliers within the country
·
Pharmacists’ quality
checks of the physical properties of the medicines and cosmetics on receipt at
any franchise branch. Any quality issues shall be reported to the National Drug
Authority (NDA)
Steps for Achieving Goals
Northern
Pharma’s strategy for achieving our goals consists of six major points:
I.
Establish an effective
marketing and sales campaign
II.
Recruit well-trained,
qualified and enthusiastic staff
III.
Provide high quality
and affordable medicines
IV.
Deliver superior patient
care knowledge
V.
Provide high-quality
customer service
VI.
Establish delivery to
facilities services
Risks Associated with Growth
We
see some risks associated with our expected growth:
I.
Losing touch with
customers
II.
Loss of clientele to
other providers
III.
Quality of services
diminished
IV.
New businesses
