The Irish pharma industry is one of our big success stories

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According to Trevor Cadden, the global industry has already been reconfiguring its supply chains and engaging in co-opetition and disintermediation. Co-opetition sees erstwhile competitors engage in co-operation and a pooling of resources for mutual benefit. Disintermediation sees firms shortening their supply chains by buying some of their key suppliers.

“More and more companies are vertically integrating by buying their tier one and two suppliers,” says Cadden. “They see the value in owning part of the supply chain. They are bringing together different parts of the chain using systems integration.”

And they are still carrying out manufacturing here.

“Years ago it made sense to move manufacturing to where it could be done cheaper to countries like Poland, Brazil or China,” says Cadden. “Because of the high level of value add it can be done here. It is not a labour-intensive process and there is a lot of robotics and automation employed. It can almost be difficult to find people on the factory floor. That has allowed Ireland to become a centre of excellence.”