Fpt Long Chau Pharma Joint Stock Company (Vietnam)

FPT Digital Retail Joint Stock Company (known as FPT Retail) started business with the phone store chain - FPT Shop. However, the increasingly difficult electronics retail segment, rapid saturation rate, and fierce competition made FPT Retail decide to turn to a new direction with the acquisition of Long Chau pharmacy chain in 2017. As a part of the restructuring plan, FPT Retail established the subject - FPT Pharma to undertake and operate FPT Long Chau pharmacy chain in the third quarter of 2018. Since 2021, this pharmacy chain has recorded a profit - 2 years earlier than the original plan of being profitable in 2023.​According to media information, FPT Long Chau pharmacy chain's difference compared to other pharmacy chains is its proactive change in applying digitalization to sales. For example, in the first 5 months of 2022, FPT Long Chau pharmacy chain applied AI to nearly 300 pharmacies to optimize the customer experience. This helped FPT Long Chau pharmacy chain have a returning customer rate of 70%, and 100% of applied pharmacies had an increase in revenue. In addition, this pharmacy chain has strengths in competitive selling prices and full product supply. While competitors are not expected to open more, or even close ineffective pharmacies, FPT Retail has promoted the development of FPT Long Chau pharmacy chain by opening new pharmacies and participating in the field of vaccination. According to FPT Retail's business report, FPT Long Chau pharmacy chain marked by exceeding its 2023 new opening plan with 447 new pharmacies opened in the first 9 months of the year. Besides, the operational efficiency was maintained, FPT Long Chau pharmacy chain still recorded average revenue/pharmacy/month at approximately VND 1.1 billion. FPT Retail continues to set the goal of having 3,000 FPT Long Chau pharmacies in the next 5 years. Although there has been no official announcement yet, some forecasts show that FPT Long Chau pharmacy chain is expected to record revenue of VND 15,257 billion in 2023 and increase to VND 19,875 billion in 2024.At present, FPT Long Chau and Pharmacity are considered the most prominent pharmacy chains leading the pharmaceutical retail industry. In fact, despite being lower in scale, FPT Long Chau pharmacy chain's business index soon surpassed Pharmacity when FPT Pharma started to record profit in 2021. Based on an interview with Ms. Nguyen Bach Diep - General Director, she shares with the press that FPT Pharma concentrates on maintaining operational efficiency per pharmacy rather than rapidly increasing the number of pharmacies to capture market share. Therefore, FPT Pharma will follow cautious business expansion strategies. With an increase in the aging population structure and also the need for healthcare after the Covid-19 pandemic, there is still a lot of growth potential for the pharmaceutical retail industry in the upcoming time.