France's pharmaceutical industry has faced two basic international realities in the last two years - the increasing pressure of governmental cost-cutting reforms and intensified competition. The result has been a speeding up of what the French call "major manoeuvers" - notably no fewer than 20 acquisitions in a 24-month period, which have had an unsettling impact on the still rather cosy world of the country's smaller drugmakers.
The leading French groups, in contrast, have reacted competitively, with Sanofi adopting a new company strategy giving priority to health care products, and the newly-created Franco-American grouping Rhone-Poulenc Rorer launching an assault on UK company Fisons (Marketletters passim) to achieve a leading world market position in the asthma and allergy treatment sectors. R-PR is also set on expansion in the generics sector with the purchase initially of Biogalenique.
The generics sector is seen as vital in light of Prime Minister Alain Juppe's high-risk strategy of reducing significantly the social security and health care budget deficits. The generics sector is still a symbolic market in France at present, accounting for just 3% compared with 30% in Germany and 45% in the USA.
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