Prospects for the development of pharmaceutical B2C

In recent years, the e-commerce market has developed rapidly, and the scale of sales of many retail products on the Internet has continued to expand. However, as a necessity for people's lives, the e-commerce road of pharmaceutical products has not gone smoothly.

According to data released by the China Pharmaceutical Business Association, China's pharmaceutical retail market is estimated to be worth 150 billion yuan in 2009, and is expected to be approximately 173.9 billion yuan in 2011. However, in 2009, domestic online drug sales were only around 70 million yuan, accounting for 0.046% of the entire pharmaceutical sales market for the same year. Although there was an increase in online retail sales in 2010, it was only just over 100 million yuan. In contrast, the proportion of sales of US online pharmacies in the entire pharmaceutical distribution sector is very high, with 20% in 2009 and close to 30% in 2010.

It can be seen that the proportion of online sales of Chinese medicine is still very small, and the development of medical e-commerce is slow. “The reasons for the slow development of medical e-commerce are the following: First, domestic e-commerce in medicine has just emerged, so there are still many imperfections in the policy. Second, many counterfeit drugs on the Internet make consumers lose confidence in online transactions. The third is that the construction of pharmaceutical logistics is still not in place, and the development of third-party pharmaceutical logistics is at an initial stage." Guo Fanli, a research fellow of China Investment Advisor Pharmaceutical Industry, said in an interview with reporters.

In an interview with the reporter, Mo Yanqing, an analyst at the China Electronic Commerce Research Center, pointed out that the drug regulatory department is strict with the sales management of pharmaceuticals and requires e-commerce companies that handle drugs to obtain “Internet Drug Trade Service Qualification Certificate” and “Internet Drug Information Service Qualification”. "Certificate", which to some extent inhibited the extensive sales of drugs.

According to relevant reports, the Beijing Municipal Food and Drug Administration had even interviewed about 9 website owners with online drug sales qualifications and requested that they not sell drugs illegally. The medical hall of the e-commerce giant Taobao Mall, headquartered in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province, was recently "brought to a halt" by the Zhejiang Food and Drug Administration because of "no license" involved in the medical B2C business. In fact, the rapid development of e-commerce and the seldom participation at the policy level are major causes. However, in the pharmaceutical industry, it can be seen that the relevant regulatory authorities are cautious.

In this regard, Mo Yuqing said that because medicines are special commodities that are different from other commodities, even if they guarantee the quality of medicines in the production process, they may cause the medicines to fail or deteriorate in transportation and warehousing. Once problems arise, they will Consumers are extremely unfavorable. So it requires professional medical e-commerce experience. This is the supervision of the online pharmaceutical B2C market, making it possible to develop in a more sound direction, and it is also a responsible act for the majority of consumers. Although it may inhibit the development of medical B2C in the short term, it can urge the healthy development of medical B2C in the long run, which is the norm for this market.

In fact, for the development of medical e-commerce, people in the industry generally hold a good attitude. The advantage of online pharmacies is to break geographical restrictions, and at the same time, it is more convenient and faster, and the cost and efficiency are improved. “As early as 2007, the US pharmaceutical e-commerce market scale was nearly 170 billion U.S. dollars. Last year, U.S. pharmaceutical e-commerce accounted for nearly 30% of the entire pharmaceutical circulation, but China’s pharmaceutical e-commerce market scale is only several billion, and it is now In the bud, there is huge room for future development, said Guo Fanli.

Mo Yanqing also expressed the same point of view. She believes that the future medicine has the potential to become a new competition point for B2C companies. At present, the market share of pharmaceutical B2C is not large. There is still much room for medical B2C mining. Each online store sees its potential, so they have entered the pharmaceutical industry. This will become a trend.