JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) -South African drugmaker Aspen Pharmacare on Wednesday reported a 37% rise in interim profit for the half year ending Dec. 31, as its branded medicines division benefited from rising demand during the successive waves of the coronavirus.
Its headline earnings per share – the main profit measure in South Africa – was at 777.2 cents ($0.5127) for the half year, up from 566.2 cents posted in the year ago period.
The pharmaceutical company sells branded prescription drugs, over-the-counter medicines and sterile products, or those that are directly administered into blood vessels.
It also does contract manufacturing for other pharmaceutical companies.
Aspen said on Tuesday that it had concluded an agreement with Johnson & Johnson to package, sell and distribute the American group’s COVID vaccines under its own brand in Africa, called Aspenovax.
“We expect a material jump to our annual revenues and profits from next year (on account of Aspenovax),” said CEO Stephen Saad.
Its revenues for the half year were up 4% at 19.4 billion rand, driven by organic growth and supported by almost 800 million rand of sales of COVID vaccines to Johnson & Johnson.
($1 = 15.1579 rand)
(Reporting by Promit Mukherjee, Editing by Louise Heavens)
