German pharma company head expresses concern on Europe

The head of the German multinational pharmaceutical and technology company Merck Group expressed concern on Tuesday on business conditions for the pharmaceuticals sector in Europe, reported dpa.

"Europe is falling behind other regions to some extent in stimulating innovation," Belén Garijo told the German business daily Handelsblatt. Government bureaucracy was hampering innovation to a greater extent, she said.

"We in Europe are working in a highly regulated environment, in which the regulations do not always align with each other and are even contradictory to some extent," Garijo said.

Companies were faced with the question whether the effort was worth it, but Merck was sticking to its plan to invest around €1.5 billion in its main plant at Darmstadt to the south of Frankfurt by 2025, she said.

Two aspects were key to Europe's competitiveness, Garijo said. These were the protection of intellectual property through the patent protection period for medications, and the possibility of licensing medications and introducing them to the market quickly.

German competitor Bayer recently announced it would focus more on the United States and China. The Leverkusen-based company described the European business environment as hostile to innovation.

In Germany, the sector is up in arms over government plans to impose price cuts on medications to reduce costs to health insurers. Switzerland's Roche has lodged legal action on competition grounds.

Turning to Merck's involvement in China, Garijo rejected calls to disengage on geopolitical grounds. "I see delinking in the next two decades as unfeasible," she said.