I will now explain the financial results for the FY 2024. This is a summary. Revenue increased 6.9%, core operating profit increased by 7.4%, and operating profit grew by 11.7%. Efforts to maintain product value has led to an improvement in sales prices, and the sales of existing products have increased, particularly for products launched in recent years, items covered by the selective medical treatment system, and items for which limited shipments have been lifted. On the other hand, investments in human resources with a view to the sustainability and future growth of generic business led to an increase in fixed costs, while write-downs and disposal losses, as well as impairment losses associated with portfolio reviews, also had an impact. As a result, revenue and core operating profit met the target. Operating profit fell below its revised target.
As of today, 119 items are subject to restricted or suspended shipment, and we are working diligently to increase production volume to resume shipment for those items. Next, the financial results. Both revenue and profits have shown growth in comparison to the previous year. Net income attributable to owners of the parent was significantly higher than the previous year due to the gain on sale of shares in the U.S. business, which was transferred in April last year. Figures from revenue to profit before tax are the amounts of the Japan business as continuing operations, but profit attributable to owners of the company, a combined total of continuing and discontinued operations. Next is revenue. In the second half, proactive lifting of shipments restrictions and introduction of the selective medical treatment system, sales of existing products increased.
New products from FY 2024 have missed targets but were able to gain certain share, and we are aiming at further more adoption of them. Next is core operating profit analysis. Gross profit increased as a result of higher sales and improved unit price. However, as fixed expenses, including depreciation or labor and write-downs and disposal losses increased, net increase of core operating profit was JPY 1.8 billion. This is operating profit analysis. In addition to the factors behind the changes in core operating income, gains on sales of tangible fixed assets were recorded, resulting in an overall increase of JPY 2.2 billion. Next is the forecasts for FY 2025. Although there will be negative impact by the drug price revision, revenue is forecasted to increase 5.9% from previous year, with higher sales volume and other reasons.
As for profits, recruitment of talents or investment to new business for mid- to long-term growth will increase those costs. However, with higher sales and improved profitability, core operating profit will increase by 8.9% and operating profit will be up 23.0%. In addition, due to the absence of gains on sales of shares in affiliated companies recorded in the previous fiscal year, net income attributable to owners of the company is expected to decrease by 24.1%. This is about main drivers of revenue and cost of sales increases. Revenue is expected to increase due to the impact of drug price revisions, as well as increased sales volume, efforts to maintain product value, and improvements in product mix resulting from expanded sales of products launched in FY 2024. For cost of sales, we anticipate an increase in variable and labor costs associated with expansion of manufacturing personnel.
Although costs will continue to increase due to the recruitment of human resources with a view to future growth, gross profit is expected to increase by JPY 7.6 billion due to an increase in sales volume. Next is about main reasons of changes in SG&A and R&D expenses. Due to upfront investments in new businesses and increased costs associated with inherited products, we expect SG&A expenses to increase 21.2% year-on-year. R&D expenses are expected to remain at the same level as the previous fiscal year, excluding the impairment loss of JPY 3 billion recorded last fiscal year. From here, Mr. Kimura, President of Sawai Pharmaceutical, will explain the progress of the medium-term plan.
First, I will explain the positioning of the current medium-term business plan beyond 2027. These three years mark the midpoint of our journey toward our 2030 long-term vision.
We will lay the foundations for a leap forward in our next mid-term business plan and sow the seeds for future growth. In addition to investing in growth in the generic drug business, we will invest in synergistic areas, review our portfolio and capital policy, and promote management with a keen awareness of key indicators. This is a summary of environment around the generic drug industry. With the reform of the drug pricing system, all companies are required to take measures to achieve a sustainable industrial structure, such as establishing a stable supply system that ensures quality and securing surplus production capacity. In the future, the winners and losers among companies will become more apparent and industry consolidations and eliminations are expected to accelerate.
As a key theme for growth, firstly, we set establishing a trusted corporate foundation as the basis. In addition, we have set three themes for each of two perspective: business strategy and business foundation. This is an overview of four improvement initiatives aimed at establishing a trusted corporate foundation. Each initiative is being steadily promoted. The corporate culture reform project, in particular, is being led directly by the president. In addition, we are reevaluating existing products and reviewing and strengthening our organizational structure to reflect administrative penalties. Next is about strengthening governance. As described, we have established a transparent system in which the president, responsible officers, and the general managers are accountable. Pages 19 to 21 introduce initiatives to enhance GMP and GQP capabilities and strengthen coordination between headquarters and factories.
I skip the details, through compliance training and organizational culture reform, management and frontline employees are working together to foster a culture of quality. Next, I will discuss the key themes of our business strategy. This is an overview of the measures and investments aimed at achieving steady growth and business sustainability in the generic drug market. Progress toward the final year's target is as shown. It was generally in line with plans, challenges remain in expanding market share. One of the drivers of market share expansion is the steady development and the launch of new products. The list below shows products that we have launched alone or with only a few other competitors over the past three years. We were able to launch products for many items. This is our development plan for new products.
We will continue to leverage our formulation technology to develop competitive products and launch them alone, so we can grow our earnings and market share. Another growth driver is the strengthening of stable supply capabilities. By increasing the operating rates of Trust Pharmatech and the new building at the second Kyushu plant, and improving the production efficiency of existing plants, we will resolve the drug shortage issue and improve profitability at the same time. This is the status of recruitment for production staff. Staff shortages are a common challenge for all companies, but through proactive recruitment and investment in training, we plan to increase our workforce by 150 in fiscal 2024 and by 271 in fiscal 2025, including 201 new college graduates. Although there will be a temporary cost impact, we expect this to contribute to medium to long-term growth. Our company boasts industry-leading production capacity and sales volume.
Looking ahead to the launch of new products, the early resolution of supply shortages, and industry restructuring and consolidation, we will expand our current production capacity of 20.5 billion tablets to 22 billion tablets during the medium-term plan period and aim to establish a production capacity of 25 billion tablets by fiscal 2030 through additional investment and all other available means. The last theme of our business strategy is continued investment in growth areas. In particular, we plan to launch the medical device, Relivion, and the alcohol intake reduction therapy support app, HAUDY, within this fiscal year. Through these and other initiatives aimed at extending healthy life expectancy, we are looking to achieve growth beyond fiscal 2030. Please refer to each slide, page 29 and 30, for details about Relivion and HAUDY. Lastly, our chairman, Mr. Sawai, will explain our key themes based on our business foundation.
From here, we will explain our key themes for strengthening our business foundation. Regarding the development of talent, we have positioned the securing and development of diverse human resources as the key to medium to long-term growth and implement the action plan outlined below as placing the investment in human capital as one of our most important priorities. In terms of sustainability, we are addressing ESG issues such as climate change response, promotion of ID&E, and governance enhancement, and made progress again in fiscal 2024. We will continue to make steady progress toward achieving our numerical targets. This is about the transition to becoming a company with an Audit and Supervisory Committee, which we announced in March.
Objective of this transition is to enrich the board of directors through expansion of directors for the improvement of governance quality, to enhance monitoring quality, mainly in management policies and strategies, to improve our corporate value, and to accelerate decision-makings with the delegation of authorities in executions. This is the list of planned officers under the new structure. There are three candidates for the new board. We selected them based on their knowledge of the healthcare industry, particularly their insight into the rapidly globalizing fields of medicine and the pharmacology, as well as their knowledge of corporate management and practical experience, financial and accounting skills, and other factors. Finally, here is our progress on improving capital efficiency. In the first year, we focused on improving profitability and achieved our targets for ROE and ROIC, excluding the impact of the sale of our U.S. business.
We will continue to strive for further improvements in profitability toward achieving our targets for the final year. Page 36 is our main initiatives for improving capital efficiency and reducing capital cost. We report and discuss these initiatives at quarterly board meetings and reflect them in our actions. We will continue steady implementation toward further improvement. Next, I will explain the cash allocation for the previous fiscal year and the current fiscal year and beyond. During the current medium-term plan period, we prioritized growth investments such as research and development, production capacity expansion, and the reliability assurance using a total of JPY 190 billion, consisting of JPY 145 billion in operating cash flow generated by the generic drug business and JPY 45 billion in funds from the sale of businesses and assets.
Additionally, using proceeds from the sale of U.S. operations and strategically held shares, we will return shareholders about JPY 52 billion through share buybacks and dividends. We will continue to pursue both sustainable growth and shareholder returns. Next is our shareholder return policy. Based on a basic dividend payout ratio of 3% or more, we plan to pay an annual dividend of JPY 53 per share for fiscal 2024, highest in our history. And an additional JPY 2 per share for fiscal 2025, bringing the total of JPY 55 per share. Last fiscal year, we repurchased JPY 33 billion worth of our own shares. Going forward, we will continue to implement share buybacks flexibly as part of our efforts to improve capital efficiency and enhance shareholder returns, considering factors such as free cash flow and market conditions.
Finally, our quantitative targets for the current fiscal year, the final year of the medium-term plan, and also fiscal 2030. There are no changes at this point, and the entire company will work together with a strong commitment to achieving these targets. Page 40 onwards contains reference materials such as financial data. This concludes the explanation of financial results of fiscal year 2024.