Ladies and gentlemen, good afternoon. I cordially welcome you to the Conference Call on Galenica's half-year results 2022. We can once again present very good results. In the first part of today's call, we will comment on a few highlights and on the key figures. After that, we will be happy to answer your questions. To start I now hand over the floor to Marc.
Thank you, Felix. Dear ladies and gentlemen, welcome to our half-year call 2022. The first half year in which we have regained a bit of normality after two years of pandemic. This means that the corona-related extraordinary additional sales, such as self-tests and COVID-19 vaccinations, have declined sharply. On the other hand, people are on the move again, and customer flows at high-frequency locations have increased again. Demand for products whose sales have suffered in the last two years due to corona have also risen again. Because protective measures have been lifted, there has been an increase in colds and people are traveling abroad again and stocking up their first aid kits. Finally, acquisitions and internal growth have also contributed to the fact that we are able to increase sales by 5.5% and EBITDA by 4.4% in the first half of 2022.
Here are a few insights. We have 30 million customer contacts in our pharmacies every year. Every day, we look after about 100,000 patients. They all increasingly appreciate our advice and services. In the first six months of 2022 alone, we provided around 43,000 primary care consultations in our pharmacies. This is 60% more than in the previous period. This figure is impressive per se, and even more so when you consider that the patients have to pay for the consultations and any medications they receive out of their own wallets. If they had seen a doctor first, in most cases, the health insurance would have covered the costs. CSS and SWICA have recognized the advantages of primary care and offer the health consultations in their insurance models. We would be pleased if we could also win additional health insurers for this model.
It is a model that not only offers patients great added value, it relieves other service providers and contributes to reducing the overall costs of treatment. Health checks, vaccinations, or the primary care consultations are great examples of how pharmacies can position themselves as the first point of contact for health issues and demonstrate their expertise. For this, specific professional expertise is needed, and that is why we invest a lot in additional training for our employees. To further improve the quality and range of training, we have taken a 50% stake in Medinform. Medinform is a leader in pharmacy training offering 50 different FPH courses for pharmacists and pharmaceutical assistants. In addition, Medinform successfully offers concepts for specialized pharmacies, from skin pharmacies to children's pharmacies to pharmacies specializing in respiratory care. Our employees are proud that they can provide comprehensive and specialized advice and care to customers.
It enriches their work and gives them the opportunity to use their full expertise. For Galenica, this is an additional strong evidence for positioning ourselves as an attractive employer. We are also experiencing the consequences of the shortage of skilled workers, and have even had to temporarily close a pharmacy in recent months, simply because we do not have enough employees to ensure proper operations. At the beginning of the year, we therefore formed an interdisciplinary working group. The team has developed various measures. Some of them are creative and unconventional ideas at short notice to ease the current situation at least a bit. For example, retired employees temporarily support their former colleagues in the pharmacies or students as so-called temporary specialists in training. We also developed special programs for newcomers and later on entrants and offer students positions for the mandatory assistantship year.
It is not only the demand in the stationary pharmacies that has grown. By the way, four new locations were added in the first half of 2022. The home care offers have also developed positively. Above all, MediService with a 16.2% increase in sales. With the new software from Aquantic, which we acquired in July, we are making the billing of specific medicines much easier. The software links pharmaceutical companies, health insurers, and doctors involved in such a process. This is another new digital offer from Galenica for professionals who gain efficiency thanks to the digital solution. At the same time, we are increasing quality throughout the entire process, and everyone in the healthcare system, partners and patients, will benefit from this. This mainly concerns the reimbursement of medicines that are not listed on the Specialties List.
Often, these are medicines for the treatment of rare, very severe, or chronic diseases. MediService is the market leader in these specific therapeutic areas. Aquantic is therefore an ideal complement to MediService. Together, they will be able to explore numerous synergies. With the joint venture, Emeda, which we founded together with Medicall, we have also expanded the range of services for professionals, in this case, especially for retirement and nursing homes. The mobile doctors of Emeda are specialized in the outpatient geriatric medical care of the residents of nursing homes. We bring logistical and pharmaceutical expertise to the joint venture. Together, we have one goal, to provide all-round health care for the residents of retirement and nursing homes and to support the carers. Home care and care homes, both are markets that are strongly influenced by the demographic aging of society and the cost pressure in the healthcare system.
More and more also by the increasing shortage of family doctors and currently also of specialists in general. We want to offer attractive solutions for the growing demand for outpatient and inpatient care, and thus grow in the future markets. In the second half of the year, we will also be able to offer professionals innovations in product range. As of October, Verfora will exclusively take over the Swiss distribution of products from Boiron, a leading global manufacturer and distributor of homeopathic medicines. The specialized trade will benefit from an expanded attractive range in the field of complementary medicine, including training expertise. The basis for growth is also our investment in digitization. This includes digital healthcare platforms. They are an important element if we as Galenica want to be a leader in the field of digital healthcare services and the networking of on and offline offerings.
That's why we are not only developing our own platform, but also partnering with others. After we launched a successful flu vaccination pilot with Well in 2021, our participation in the health platform is a logical next step. In parallel we are working on development of our own platform, the customer dashboard as we call it at the moment. We will introduce the first small innovation step by step. After two years of corona lockdown, the first half of 2022 was challenging for many online shops. Worldwide, e-commerce sales declined by 5% and order volumes even by 11%. Sales at our web shops declined by 12%. This in comparison to an exceptionally strong first half of 2021. Nevertheless, the consistent linking of the online and offline channels is showing clear initial successes.
We have invested in the visibility of our webshops, for example in search engines where we have achieved a significant improvement. In the process, we have also clearly seen that better online visibility also leads to more presence in the stationary pharmacies. Compared to the first half of 2021, this year, 20% more customers who visit our webshops have subsequently gone to a stationary pharmacy. When we talk about digitization, the e-prescription should not be forgotten. In the first half of the year, we continued to work intensively on our solution and the link with the eMediplan. In the second half of the year, we will start further pilots with doctors, pharmacists and patients. We want to put our solution through its paces and test how it performs in everyday life.
In addition to the various projects we developed for our customers and for the market, we invest in digitization of our own processes. All of those investments in the technical foundations for the future, it will take some patience before we can reap these rewards. However, we will complete a major investment this autumn. After about three years of renovation and modernization work, we will officially open the new distribution center in Lausanne, Écublens in September. During the entire construction work, operations continued in parallel. A great challenge, which the whole team has mastered superbly. Some facts. The entire building shell was completely renewed. 10,000 cu m of new storage capacity was created by raising the height of the building.
At the same time, the degree of automation was increased from 30%-70%, thanks to new picking order system. The so-called carousel for those who have already been to Niederbipp before. In addition, a new solar system was installed on the roof on an area of 300 sq m , which will contribute an important part of the building's required energy. Last but not least, we have also efficiency gains in office space. State-of-the-art workstations have been installed in Écublens, allowing us to close the offices at the former site in Saint-Sulpice. We are aware of our role and responsibility for the security of the supply of medicines in Switzerland. The investment of around CHF 35 million is therefore also a strong commitment by Galenica to the western part of Switzerland.
The good results we were able to present to you today are thanks to our employees. They have been very challenged in the recent months, especially in the pharmacies, where there have been repeated staff shortages. I would like to take this opportunity to thank them all for their great commitment. Bravo, and thank you. We have made strong progress in the first half of 2022 with the financial key figures and thanks to the consistent implementation of our strategy. We will maintain this focus in the coming months. With that, I hand over to our Chief Financial Officer, Felix.
Thank you Marc, Galenica grew strongly in the first half of 2022. The growth of 5.5% was achieved even though as expected sales from COVID-19 initiatives such as self-tests, vaccinations, and testing were much lower than in the first half of 2021. Adjusted for these extraordinary sales, growth would have amounted to 8.7%. The main growth driver were sales of OTC medications. This was thanks to a normal flu season, which was practically absent in the prior year period, and additional Omicron infection rates. MediService continues to grow strongly in the area of orphan drugs. Last year's acquisitions, Lifestage Solutions, the products of Dr. Wild and Spagyros, as well as some pharmacies, also contributed positively to sales growth. Finally, the pharma wholesale business continued to develop well. Let's look into the various business areas.
At first glance, growth in the stationary pharmacies of Amavita and Sun Store was only moderate, at 1.8%. However if we adjust for the extraordinary sales with COVID-19 initiatives in the local pharmacy sector we get a rather impressive growth of 7.5%. As already mentioned, high demand for cough and cold medications was the key driver of this growth. As people are on the move again, sales of pharmacies at high-frequency locations are also recovering. In June, sales were about 12% below the pre-corona period of 2019. In December last year, this shortfall was still about 20%. Pharmacy network expansion contributed 1% to growth. Again, pharmacies at home grew stronger than local pharmacies. The reported growth of the pharmacies at home sector was 16.1%. This includes a one-off effect from an insignificant change in segment reporting.
Adjusted for this special effect, growth was still a very high 11.3%. This growth was again driven by the specialty pharmacy, MediService. With medicines for rare diseases in combination with home care services, MediService achieved high growth of 16.2% and thus gained further market share. Bichsel's home care services in the area of clinical nutrition also grew by a pleasing 5%. On the other hand, the web shop sales of Amavita and Sun Store declined by 12.5%. As the online sale of OTC medications continues to be prohibited, this business was unable to benefit from the growth with cough and cold medications. On the contrary, sales have decreased as customers have again purchased more locally in stationary pharmacies and not online after the corona restrictions were lifted.
The sector that benefited most from the flu and Omicron waves was products and brands. Sales growth in products and brands was exceptionally high at 26%. Half of this growth resulted from the integration of Dr. Wild products in June 2021 and Spagyros in September 2021. The other 13% growth was driven in particular by a high demand for cough and cold medications due to seasonal flu and Omicron. Travel-related products, which suffered heavily in the corona years, have also recovered. Thanks to the expansion and this above average performance, Verfora has continued to gain market share and further strengthened its position as clear market leader. In the consumer healthcare market, only the OTC category grew strongly with 10.1%. Within OTC, there were sub-categories such as cough remedies that practically doubled sales. The other categories, personal care, patient care, and nutrition, developed more or less stable.
Market sales of Verfora products in pharmacies and drugstores grew by 17.2%, thus well above the market average. Thanks to the strong focus on the cough and cold range, Verfora was able to benefit from the above average development of these product categories and therefore gained market share. Let us now move on from the products and care segment to logistics and IT. The wholesale sector achieved a pleasing sales growth of 3.8%. Adjusted for the sales of COVID-19 sales tests, growth was a high 6.9%. The physician segment realized again the highest growth. Adjusted for the one-off effect of a minor change in segment reporting, sales with physicians grew even by 8.4%. Adjusted for COVID-19 sales tests, the pharmacy segment also achieved pleasing growth of 7.8%.
Let us now have a look at the development of the pharmaceutical market. All channels have grown strongly from hospitals with 5.4% to drugstores with 12.6%. The impact of the flu and Omicron waves can be seen in particular in the development of the volumes, which grew faster than sales everywhere. The high growth with OTC medications primarily drove the volume development at the local pharmacies with 14.7% and the drugstores with 17.2%. Only the mail order pharmacies were not able to take advantage of this development, also for the well-known reason that OTC medicines may not be supplied by mail order. In terms of volume, this channel even declined by 1.7%. Thanks to the strong growth of high-priced prescription medicines, sales nevertheless rose by 8.2%.
Overall, this resulted in a strong market growth of 7.1%. Now let's leave sales development and talk about results. The operating results are almost at the same level as the previous year's period, both on group and segment level. We succeeded in compensating for the extraordinarily high income from the COVID-19 initiatives in the first half 2021 with growth and expansion of the business. A very good result above our own expectations. Return on sales has normalized as expected after the COVID-19 boost last year, and is back at the same level as in the pre-corona financial year, 2019. Also a solid result. Why have we not been able to further improve return on sales as in the previous years?
On the one hand, in the last two years, and in the first half of this year, we have grown above average in the wholesale sector and with the specialty pharmacy MediService, both low-margin businesses. Of course, we are very happy to accept this kind of pressure on the EBIT margin. On the other hand, as expected, additional costs have a dampening effect on EBIT development in the first half of 2022. In the EBIT guidance 2022, published in March, we referred to the increasing challenges with issues such as inflation, supply bottlenecks, shortage of specialized personnel, and investments in digital infrastructure. How did these current trends impact the results in the first half year? Personnel costs have developed normally at 4.9%, slightly slower than the net sales, with a growth rate of 5.5%.
The increase is mainly related to the expansion and growth of the business. We have planned higher personnel costs, but unfortunately we could not spend them because we were not able to recruit enough specialized employees. Especially in IT, the missing staff was partly compensated with additional external resources, which was translated into higher other costs. Apart from the normal growth-related increase in other OpEx, the additional investments in the digital omni-channel infrastructure were clearly the most important driver. The measures against the lack of skilled employees and the inflation impact accounted for a smaller part of these additional costs. Regarding the supply bottlenecks, to date, we have still been able to overcome the challenges without any significant negative impacts on our results. Our digitalization initiatives are also reflected in CapEx. Investments in intangible assets were CHF 6.4 million higher than in the prior year period.
We continue to invest in the SAP implementation at Galexis, and additionally, in the digital omni-channel infrastructure. Total investments as a percentage of sales have remained stable at 1.6% compared to the full 2021 financial year. This brings us to cash flow. Two negative effects led to the negative cash flow of CHF 95.9 million in the increase of net working capital. On the one hand, a seasonal effect. It is normal that the net working capital is higher in the middle of the year than at the end of the year. In addition, net working capital was exceptionally low at the end of last year, thanks to the very strong business performance in November and December 2021. In the 2021 half year financial statements, these two effects did not accumulate, but compensated each other.
At the end of 2020 financial year, the net working capital was extraordinarily high because of the corona-related poor business performance at the end of the year. By mid-2021, the corresponding cash inflow from the reduction in net working capital has offset the negative seasonal effect. Regarding the end of this year we still expect a negative effect which should however be somewhat lower than the -CHF 95.5 million due to seasonality, depending on the business performance at the end of the year. In addition to the higher investments in tangible and intangible assets, we also invested CHF 9.8 million in financial assets in the first half year. Particularly worth mentioning here are the participations in the Well platform and in the Emeda joint venture.
The negative free cash flow, together with the dividend payment of CHF 104 million, led to an increased net debt from CHF 258 million at the end of 2021 to CHF 402 million by mid-2022. Compared to the extraordinarily low level of net debt at the end of 2021, this can be considered as a normalization. Net debt remains practically unchanged compared to mid-2021. Leverage also remains at a level of 1.6 x EBITDA. Finally, let's look at the guidance update. Sales growth in the first half year was clearly above our expectations. In the second half of the year, we expect growth to slow down considerably as the second half of 2021, especially the last quarter, was very strong. We now expect sales growth of 2%-4% for the full financial year 2022.
In parallel to the increase in sales guidance, we are also raising EBIT guidance to +8% to +12% based on adjusted EBIT 2021, excluding the extraordinary contributions from the COVID-19 initiatives and the real estate sale at our headquarters in Bern. To summarize, we can look back on a successful first half year with strong sales growth and solid results, and we are confident that we will also deliver the expected performance in the second half of the year. Thank you for your attention. We will now be happy to take your questions. If you have a question please raise your hand virtually on Zoom.
First question on Zoom is from Mr. Jan Koch. Mr. Koch, you will get a speaking invitation. Please accept the invitation before asking your question.
Great. Good afternoon. Can you hear me?
Yes, we can hear you.
Perfect.
Hello.
Yeah. Hi. Thanks for taking my questions. I've got three, please. Firstly, on your supply chain, I heard from several pharmacists here in Germany that it is increasingly difficult to get sufficient supplies of certain OTC medicine. Are you witnessing similar issues? And if so, does that slow down your sales growth in the second half of the year? Then secondly, on the potential impact from a recessionary environment, have you started to witness a softening of customer demand in recent months on the back of some limitations on discretionary spending, especially in your product and brand business.
Then thirdly, in view of the current inflationary environment, in which segments are you able to offset higher costs from inflationary trends by passing on higher prices to customers? By what amount have you increased these prices so far?
Thank you, Jan, for these questions. The first one, supply chain problems with OTC medicines. In the first half of this year, we can say this effect didn't slow down the sales of OTC medications in our pharmacies. As mentioned, we have supply chain challenges at Verfora. That our third-party manufacturers still can produce enough products. There, we had some challenges. We missed some sales because of these problems. As I mentioned in the presentation, this to date hasn't had any material impact on our results. How it will develop in the second half we don't know. We assume that it will remain a challenging situation for our businesses. The second question there I can answer.
We haven't seen a softening customer demand over the last months. There we haven't seen a measurable impact because of these potential future economic problems. The last question was how we are able to offset higher inflation costs. It's clear, let's say half of our business is regulated business. There, the costs of goods sold are regulated and sales prices are regulated. On one side, we have no pressure with the buying of the product. On the other hand, we have no chance to pass on higher costs to customers. On the other half of our business, OTC medications, other products, we are able to pass on, depending on competition, higher costs to customers.
We can also for example in the logistics business, we have possibility to pass on higher costs with higher tariffs for our logistics solutions. I hope that was.
Yes, great.
Answer for these three questions.
Yes, it was One follow-up if I may. Have you started to increase your prices so far? By what amount in the 50% where you are able to increase prices?
We have started to increase prices. I can't tell you to which amount. It's clear if we get higher prices from our suppliers, then we also if possible adapt our selling prices. It's really an ongoing process.
Okay, great. Thanks a lot.
Thank you.
The next question comes from Sebastian Vogel at UBS.
Hello, can you hear me?
Yes. Hello, Sebastian. We can hear you, yes.
Perfect. Great. I've got three questions. I will ask them one by one. The first one would be with regard to the net working capital. In that regard, the payables seems to have not kept the pace that receivables and on inventory side that we have seen there. What was the driver that your payable position was not getting higher so to say?
Sorry, that was too quick as a question. It was too fast for me to really get the question. Can you perhaps a little bit slower repeat your question? That would be really appreciated.
Of course. Yeah. With regard to the net working capital, I mean, your receivables were picking up, your inventory was picking up, payables were not really picking up a lot. In that sense the question, what was there the driving factor why payables were not really getting higher, and therefore you have this higher net working capital in that regard compared to last year?
Well at the end of last year, payables were exceptionally high. They were exceptionally high because in November, December, we sold a lot. Business was very strong, and we had to let's say refill our stock. All purchases in December they weren't paid yet at the end of the year. Payables at the end of the year were very high. That's the main reason why net working capital at the end of last year was exceptionally low. In combination, receivables, that's the seasonality impact. They are always lower at the end of the year, because normally, Galexis, our wholesaler, invoices once a month to the customers. Always in December, Galexis invoices twice a month.
That means at the end of year, we have lower receivables than normal and more cash. Now as the business was exceptionally strong last year, this seasonal impact was also exceptionally strong. These were the two reasons why end of last year net working capital was very low. Now this can be considered as a normalization now the level we have now at mid of this year. Does that answer your question?
Yep, that helps a lot. Many thanks.
Thank you.
With regard to the second question, you mentioned there were some accounting changes that have impacted pharmacies at home and retail in H1, the top line. Is that something that will reverse in the second half or will it be accompanying us also in the second half or how should we think about this effect going forward?
We will see a similar impact in the second half of the year. I can explain you what it was. We have. You know, Pharmapool is a service, it's a doctor's wholesaler in the segment logistics and IT. There is, since the acquisition, a small mail order pharmacy in the Pharmapool business. Until last year, we have consolidated Pharmapool as a whole in the logistics and IT segment. Now since this year, we report the small mail order pharmacy of Pharmapool in the products and care segment. For this change, we haven't done a restatement of the accounts because of materiality. To analyze the sales, we transparently show now the impact and we will have a comparable impact in the second half.
Got it. Many thanks. The third question would be on the distribution margin and the proposal by the Ministry of Health. How do you see that potentially impacting you if it would be becoming enacted in the way that it is currently proposed?
You know, there are so many proposals. It's very difficult to answer your questions. We say that you remember we said, if the proposal of Curafutura and pharmacies would pass, then we assume that this should be profit neutral with a challenge for mail order pharmacies. They would have to adapt their business model because they don't charge fees for services. That was the answer, and is still the answer for this proposal of Curafutura and their pharmacies. There was another proposal from the Federal Office of Public Health with another solution with a different margin steps and the main proposal was to have a unique margin, the lowest margin for the same active ingredients in a medication.
This proposal, it's very difficult or we are not able really to forecast the impact on our profit because first of all it's very difficult to make a forecast based on this model. There is no proposal with which LOA contract this would be combined. If we don't know what would be then the proposal for the fees for services, we can't calculate an overall impact on our margin. We can't forecast for this model. Then in June, Federal Council launched a third consultation based on a similar proposed margin as Federal Office of Public Health proposed, together with additional proposals for a reduction of generic prices and other measures. This proposal, which is now in consultation, is not specific enough.
There are too many question marks in this proposal, so we are not in a position to calculate potential impact. We also can't give you an update on the discussions. It's really open. What is for sure that at least until mid of next year, even if at the end of the year, we don't expect any changes to be implemented.
Got it. Many thanks.
The next question comes from, Ms. Virendra Chauhan. Chauhan. Sorry.
Yes. Can you hear me?
Yes, Virendra, we can hear you, yes. You can pose your question.
Yes. I did unmute and I think you can hear me now.
Very good. Thank you.
Okay. The first question is around the guidance. Just as a reminder, what I understand is that there's about CHF 34 million in basket of one-offs in the earlier year based on the commentary that you have issued. CHF 25 million coming from the COVID tailwinds last year and about CHF 9 million coming from the one-off gain on the sale of property. Now, that puts me at a base of CHF 179 million. Firstly, I just wanted to confirm if that's right. The guidance is obviously based off that for 8%-12% growth.
Now, with about 19.8% that was done on a normalized level in H1, and my belief is that the OTC sales are really going to be strong with the COVID-19 and, you know, flu really blurring in terms of the treatment or options, because the lines are blurring between the two, and the feedback that we are getting from the market is that there's going to be, you know, ongoing demand for these OTC medicines and also the fact that high-frequency locations are now recovering. They're about 12% below pre-COVID, versus about 20% at the year-end. It's just seeming that, you know, the H2 will probably be up in terms of EBIT at about 5%.
You know, with these kind of moving parts that seem to be positive, what's really you know driving the seemingly cautious outlook?
Thank you for your question. First of all, I can confirm that the basis is around CHF 179 million, and our guidance is calculated on this basis. You are right. It's clear in the first half of this year, adjusted for all these extraordinary impacts, EBIT growth was very strong. You also have to take into account that adjusted for the extraordinary impacts, the first half of 2021 was a very weak half year without any flu season. There, the comparison period was low. If we now look forward to second half of this year, then we compare with a very strong second half of 2022. 2022 is mainly the last quarter, November, December, as I already mentioned, was very strong with the flu season, with already Omicron infections.
If we can, let's say, repeat the results we have realized without the extraordinary impacts in H2 2021, in H2 2022, this will be a very good result. That is finally the basis for our guidance. We really need a good second half year to reach the guidance.
Okay. Particularly tough comps, that's the call-out.
Mm-hmm.
Just quickly to understand. Tough comps, particularly in Q4, so that is what I guess is driving the caution.
Oh, yes. Sure.
Yeah.
Sure. Thank you. Tough comparable.
Yeah.
You got it. Exactly. That's the difficulty.
Okay. I have a few more questions, so I'll just go one by one. In one of the pages on your report, you also say it's in the full version of the report that I was reading. You call out laboratory analysis that Galenica will undertake or offer as a service incrementally in its pharmacies. Is that something that you know, Galenica will do on their own, or will these be outsourced? Are these already contributing to the business?
I believe that Marc can answer perhaps better afterwards. I believe you refer to the expansion of our services we offer in our pharmacies. There is
Yeah.
We have healthcare services, we have primary care, and this could also be some diagnostics. But it's really.
Mm-hmm.
There we do the diagnostics, but we are not seller of diagnostic material or supplier of diagnostic materials. We are really the service provider.
Yeah.
For example, with OnlineDoctor, with Derma. What's that in English? Derma?
Dermatology.
Dermatology, for example. We started about a couple of months ago with a company called OnlineDoctor. We do the service in our pharmacies. Of course, more services in our pharmacies is clearly one of our strategy, because we want to have more services, more additional services. As I mentioned in my speech primary care we increased primary care by 60% in the first half year of 2022. That's been going on like this. We look for other services to be more, I would say to have on one part, of course, the classical pharmaceutical business, and on the other hand, also much more services. I guess for two reasons. It's the business reason, of course, and also the reason for our employees.
Because we, as I mentioned, it's quite tough to get enough employees, to get enough pharmaceutical employees. It's very important for them to really can do everything for a patient in our pharmacies. Doing services is something they love to do, and that makes Galenica also more attractive as an employer. It's very good for the business, and it helps also the doctors, because as I mentioned also in my speech, we don't have enough doctors in Switzerland, we don't have enough physicians. It helps also to help the physicians that they have enough time for the illnesses which they really needs a doctor, and not for the other illnesses.
Yeah. What I understand is will Galenica be, you know providing these tests or diagnostic tests to customers? We apply the test in our pharmacy.
Mm-hmm.
That's the main service we offer.
Mm.
in our pharmacies.
Tests, vaccinations, blood tests, whatever, and allergic tests.
Okay.
Different allergies. Yeah. That's all the services we provide in our pharmacies.
Interesting. Okay.
I guess all inclusive, I guess we have 28 algorithms in our pharmacies right now.
Just two smaller ones maybe. Is that on the local pharmacies subsegment, is it fair to say that Galenica in this half underperformed the 8.5% growth in the broader target market?
We would say that local pharmacies developed more or less in line with the market. You mentioned the pharmaceutical market growth of 8.5%.
Yeah.
This includes only medications. On the other hand, you have seen. It was 6.4% growth consumer healthcare market, where without prescription medications, but where other categories sold in pharmacies are included. Somewhere in between market growth for pharmacies would be. On top of that, you have to take into account that in the Galenica pharmacies, prescriptions with high-priced medications are transferred for efficiency reason to MediService. This strong growing category of high-priced medications, they are not accounted for, let's say, in our local pharmacies. If we compare with market growth, we have also to take into account this impact. That's why overall, we would say we have developed with the market.
Okay. Just one last one. Sorry for the very long list of questions, but are the production issues at the Bichsel Group sorted or will that continue to be an overhang into H2?
You referred to Bichsel, where we have some.
Yeah.
Yeah, there we are, solving all the issues. It's an ongoing process and we are confident that by the end of the year we will have resolved these problems. Thank you for these questions.
Thank you so much for your time.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Next in line is Christoph Gretler from Credit Suisse.
Yes. Hi. Can you hear me?
Yes. Hello. We can hear you.
Hello. Hi. Good afternoon. Thanks for taking my question. I have actually two. First, I wanted to come back to this new proposal by the FOPH on for distribution margin. I think you know that it's this slide 38 that you have in your new presentation pack. I was just wondering, is it not possible to quantify approximately how much this would you know, impact you? Because if I look at, you know, just this red and the blue line that shows, you know the current and the new proposed model, it looks as if you know, there is a substantial cut in distribution margin implied. You know?
Maybe if there was any chance to quantify that to some degree and what you essentially would have to recuperate from the managed care companies in terms of improved LOA, that would be really interesting. The second question relates to your personnel situation. I noticed your comments that, you know, you had to close one of your shops unfortunately for a couple of hours. Is this something we would need to expect more in the coming months given you know the low unemployment rates we have here? Maybe could you discuss what kind of, you know wage inflation you included in your budget for the current year and maybe for the next? Or what kind of outlook you have for that part? That would be great.
Thank you for these interesting questions. The first question, this proposal on page 38 of our new investor presentation, it's clear the chart you see we can calculate and forecast quite easily. What it makes more complicated is the sentence: The uniform margin for medications with the same active ingredient. There it makes it a little bit more complicated because there we have really to look product by product with which generic you have to compare and then calculate the lowest margin and look what is the impact overall. That makes it somewhat more complicated. Just the lines are easy.
What it makes it not possible to calculate is the fact, as I mentioned, that we don't know with which proposal for the LOA and the LOA contract and for the fee-for-services this proposal would be combined. If we compare this margin proposal just for the product margin with the proposal from pharmacies and Curafutura, this proposal from Federal Office of Public Health would probably be even more attractive for us. you know with the proposal of pharmacies and Curafutura, the loss in the product margin would be compensated with higher tariffs in the LOA contract. this impact of LOA contract we don't know if this also would apply or which version would then apply together with this new margin proposed by the Federal Office of Public Health. Is that clear enough as an answer?
Yes. No, that's very clear. I think as good as one can get, you know, here. Thank you.
Thank you.
It's complicated, I understand you know but it's really helpful. Yes.
Yeah. The second question perhaps more for the situation in the pharmacies.
Yeah.
What's your expectation? I can then perhaps answer for the inflation.
The inflation. Of course. We started a couple of months ago internally a task force where we consider all possible measures and new ideas how we can resolve the problem. To be honest, of course, that's. I guess that's not just a problem in the pharma business. As you know, it's a problem also in IT, in other businesses. The shortage of staff or personnel in the next couple of months even couple of years, will be a remaining challenging situation, of course. It's our job, and we will do everything that we do not have to close a pharmacy because of personnel shortage, that's for sure. I would never say that will never happen again. That would not be honest.
Of course we implemented a couple of new ideas. We talked about how we can resolve the problem, what can we do to be more attractive for pharmacists. As I mentioned, that it will be a remaining challenge. Like, not just for the next couple of months, for the next couple of years, I guess.
If you look at that wage inflation, I would say from 2021 to 2022, we increased salaries and let's say other staff costs, insurance, pension fund contributions overall by around 2%. I would say from last year to this year, there is a wage inflation overall of plus minus 2%. Now, guidance for 2023, we will release in March next year. It's clear we believe that we will have pressure on wages. It's clear on salary, on costs, on personnel costs because of inflation and because of the shortage of staff everywhere, that we are not yet able to give an outlook or a forecast in this regard.
Okay. Thank you. Appreciate your comments.
Next question comes from Maja Pataki.
Yeah. Hi, good afternoon. I have two questions as well. Trying to understand your comments around the comparison base with last year. You mentioned that Q4 was more normalized, a stronger flu season after things have started to open up. Yet, you know commentary from around the globe on the southern hemisphere suggests that we could be in for co-infections of the flu and COVID. I guess a real severe respiratory season could provide upside to your numbers. Is that the correct way to read it, since you said that if you have similar levels to last year you would. That's embedded in the guidance?
I tell you are right. It's clear. If the flu season or COVID season would be more severe, as you mentioned, this is an upside potential. Our guidance is based on a, let's say, normal second half of a year with a normal, let's say, flu season. That's the hypothesis.
Okay.
That's the basis for our guidance.
That's perfect. Thank you very much. The second question is on MediService. You had yet again a very strong result when we look at growth. I remember that you've been talking about that growth can be very volatile depending on the pricing of the drug. Now, we've seen a couple of really strong quarters. Is there anything in the book that you can already anticipate where you say, like you would expect MediService growth to decelerate based on the pricing that you see in the market?
First of all, this business is still volatile, as you mentioned, but it's still, as we always said, a niche which is very attractive, and we are convinced that this niche will continue to grow, but it will remain volatile. You have perhaps also seen that, let's say, price reduction impact was over 4% in the first half of the year. There we are also exposed to stronger price cuts on the medication. It's an attractive niche, but it remains volatile.
Okay. Understood. My last question is with regards to growth in logistics wholesale, where you've seen very strong growth to physicians in the first half of the year. I was wondering whether you can break it down. I guess there was an uptake as well from you know more flu-related drugs that people were getting at physician offices after self-dispensing and clear market share gains. Could you share with us what your current market share is with regards to the physician office?
We released this figure end of last year. We showed our market share, which was I think by heart around 30%. We are clear market leader. I can't give you the exact split what was let's say overall.
Growth. But normal growth. Let's take market growth in the doctor's channel as a basis. On top of that, we have seen that we won new customers. There we also gained some market share. The exact new market share figure we will again release with the year-end figures.
Perfect. Thank you very much for that.
We have one last question in line, which comes from Mr. Urs Kunz.
Hello? Hello.
Urs, you can pose your question.
Can you hear me now?
Yes.
Okay. Thanks a lot. I have three questions. First question regarding primary care. There, I mean you give us these nice numbers of rising consultations to 43,000. You have mentioned that two insurances pay for that. But as far as I understand it, these insurances pay only in some additional insurance models for that and not in the basic insurance. So my question is there also hope that we'll see that in basic insurance paid? And the second question regarding primary care, you mentioned this personnel shortage. You have this high growth rate. And how is it possible to grow this consultations in this amount of 50%-60% in the future with personnel shortages? That's my first question.
Okay, thank you for this question. We have now two insurers. CSS was the first one. CSS, you are absolutely right, it's in the additional insurance. With SWICA, it's a little bit different, but honestly, I can't explain in detail. Of course, you're absolutely right. For us, it would be great if it would be included in the basic insurance, but this process is very complicated. That you can create the new services which is included in the basic insurance, that's a long process. It takes, I guess, a couple of years.
It requires a change in law, I think.
It requires a change in law. To be honest we even don't calculate with this. For us it's even great if a couple of more insurance companies take this primary care in the additional insurance, because in Switzerland, most of the people have the additional insurance services, and that's why that's quite enough for us. Basic insurance it's even not a dream. Personnel shortage, of course, that's a big challenge. You're absolutely right. Even if you have personnel shortage as I mentioned especially the pharmacist, but also more and more pharmaceutical assistants are able to make this primary care for patients and for customers.
Even if we have personnel shortage, that's kind of part of the consultation for something in a pharmacy, and that's why it's kind of included in the whole product portfolio we have today in the pharmacy. Till today, there is not really a huge problem because of the personnel shortage. Because as I mentioned, we include more and more pharmaceutical assistants, and they are also capable to do these services, this kind of services.
Thank you. The second question is on ERP systems. As far as I understand, Alloga will be completed second half. Galexis, this is the question, how long will that take till it's completed? Then together with that, Ecublens is also completed by September, you said. This leads me to also the question regarding investments in tangibles and intangibles. Will they come down in the future years because these big cornerstones are done? Or how do you see that?
First of all, the ERP project will finalize by the end of 2024 for Alloga and for Galexis. That's the plan. What we will finalize this September is the renovation and modernization of the distribution center in Lausanne, Ecublens. That will be finalized by the end of, let's say, this year. Next year, we plan as a part of the ERP implementation to implement the new ERP system first in the smaller distribution center in Lausanne, Ecublens, and in 2024 then in the main distribution center in Niederbipp in order to finalize the project by the end of 2024. In parallel, that's what we expect then in the investments in the CapEx.
The investments in CapEx will stay at this 1.46% or wherever we are from now or if-
We believe that's still a reasonable number or to assume for the next years.
Okay. I only have one small, finishing question regarding the webshops, where you saw this drop in sales of, I think, 12%. Do you think they are coming back to growth again in the near future? Or do we have to wait till OTC will go online to see them growing again?
They will come back even without OTC, but of course, it still remains small numbers without OTC. It's still a small part of our product portfolio which we are able to sell as our webshops. That's even if it's -12%, it's a pity. Of course, we do everything that we can go the next couple of months or next year with our online shops. Total is still a very small number, and we don't expect an OTC change of the regulation before, I would say, 2024, maybe 2025. Until then, the total amount where we are able to sell through our online shops is still not on very high figures.
Of course, our ambition is not to have a minus compared with the last year. That means the -12%, of course, we do everything to grow even on the small product portfolio we can sell.
Thanks a lot.
That was the last question in line. I think Felix, you can close the half-year call.
Thank you very much. Ladies and gentlemen, we thank you all for your active participation and your interest in Galenica. Goodbye, and have a good afternoon.