Increased R&D Impacts Profits At Dainippon

Dainippon has reported higher sales for the first half of the financial year ending March 1995, of 63.5 billion yen ($654.8 million) a rise of 1.8% over the like, year-earlier period. However, net profit was lower at 2.5 billion yen, a fall of 9%, due to expenditure of 1 billion yen on the development of Spara (sparfloxacin) in the USA.

Ordinary profits at the company declined 2.2% to 5.2 billion yen. Sales of its three major products - Spara, Tosuxacin (tosufloxacin tosilate) and Flumark (enoxacin) - fell to 7.45 billion yen from 9.12 billion during the first half of 1993. Dainippon forecasts that sales for the three drugs will amount to 18 billion yen for the full year, compared to 17.8 billion for the previous term, reports Pharma Japan.

Of its other products, Ensure Liquid (a parenteral nutrition product) and Klaracid (clarithromycin) both achieved higher sales for the period with sales of 4.25 billion yen, up from 3.42 billion yen in 1993, and 3.78 billion yen, an increase from 3.18 billion yen, respectively.