Hyderabad: Ratan Tata-funded pharmacy aggregator Generic Aaadhar has come to the rescue of standalone pharmacy stores, which are facing competition from large pharmacy chains as well as online pharmacies. The company ties up with pharmacy stores and supplies them generic drugs sourced from over 25 WHO-GMP certified generic drugs manufacturers from across India, making the medicines affordable.
Founded by 18-year-old Arjun Deshpande two years back, Generic Aadhaar has introduced its generic model with hundreds of stores across India. Measures have also been taken to ensure that spurious and counterfeit drugs don’t enter the supply chain.
The company forayed into Hyderabad with its first outlet on Sunday by tying up with Sri Lakshmi Narasimha Enterprises at Mallampet. It plans to have 100 stores each in Hyderabad, Sangareddy, Rangareddy and Nizamabad in Telangana in the coming years.
Generic Aadhaar founder Arjun Deshpande told Telangana Today, “Started in February 2018, our aim is to provide affordable medicines across the nation. India had been a major exporter of generic drugs but Indians are not getting benefited by these drugs. This needed to be addressed.”
Today, the medicines, which are sold at Generic Aadhaar stores are up to 50-80 per cent lesser than the market price of the branded drugs. This particularly is helping senior citizens and pensioners, immensely.
He added, “In the last five months, we have forayed into 100 cities of India with more than 100 franchise stores. Historically, we have seen multinationals have been giving only 10-15 per cent profit margin to retailers, and these retailers are forced to give 10 per cent discount to their customers, to withstand competition, making retailers’ business unviable. We are providing the retailers 40 per cent margin as well as our proprietary software.”
Going forward, Generic Aadhaar plans to partner with 10,000 pharmacies on a franchisee basis across India in the first phase and 30,000 in the second phase. There are also plans to enter into Middle East, Dubai, Oman, Nepal, Bhutan and other South Asian countries by end of 2021.
On the high demand therapeutic products, Deshpande said, “Hypertension, gastrointestinal and diabetes drugs are the top selling products. We are making these drugs available at 80 per cent lesser than the branded drugs and soon we are aiming to make them 90 per cent lesser.”
A strip of branded Azithromycin 500 mg tablet costs anywhere between Rs 50 and 110 depending on the brand, and one can get the generic drug 80 per cent lesser at Generic Aadhaar.
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