KONTAN.CO.ID - JAKARTA. Pharmaceutical issuer, PT Kalbe Farma Tbk (KLBF), is projecting a 6% to 7% growth in revenue compared to last year's earnings. Concurrently, net profit is also expected to grow by 13% to 15% throughout 2024. 

Kalbe Farma's President Director, Vidjongtius, stated that the pharmaceutical business outlook remains promising this year. This is due to the consistently high demand for medicinal products and health services in the market.

"Especially as public awareness of healthy living continues to increase," he said when contacted by Kontan.co.id, Sunday (5/5). 

In addition, this performance target is also driven by the satisfactory performance of KLBF in the first quarter of 2024. To achieve these targets, KLBF will launch several new products this year, such as the biologics product serplulimab for cancer, health products in the sports category, and packaged milk products as well as other prescription drugs.

According to Kontan.co.id, Kalbe Farma has also prepared a capital expenditure budget (capex) of IDR 700 billion to IDR 1 trillion for this year.

As of the first quarter of 2024, KLBF has already used a capex of around IDR 215 billion for additional production capacity and new products. 

Vidjongtius stated that this year, Kalbe is still focused on expanding in the new factory for radiopharmaceutical products, cancer drugs, biological drugs, ready-to-drink (RTD) sterilized milk, and IT. 

For your information, as of the first quarter of 2024, KLBF recorded net sales of IDR 8.36 trillion, or a growth of 6.23% compared to the same period last year, which was IDR 7.87 trillion.

In its financial report, KLBF's sales were dominated by domestic sales, especially prescription drugs IDR 2.04 trillion, health products IDR 1.08 trillion, nutrition IDR 2.07 trillion, and logistics distribution IDR 2.77 trillion. Meanwhile, export sales from prescription drugs contributed IDR 148.25 billion, health products IDR 162.3 billion, and nutrition IDR 69.22 billion. 

KLBF also recorded financial expenses such as sales expenses of IDR 1.65 trillion, general and administrative expenses of IDR 358.08 billion, research expenses of IDR 90.06 billion, and interest expenses of IDR 15.04 billion. 

As a result, KLBF recorded a current year profit of IDR 987.5 billion in the first quarter of 2024. This figure is up 15.6% from the previous IDR 853.87 billion in the first quarter of 2023.

Editor: Syamsul Azhar