Celltrion posts record Q3 profit on strong biosimilar sales

Celltrion posted its best ever quarterly operating profit of 301 billion won ($211 million) in the July-to-September period this year, the Korean biopharmaceutical firm announced Tuesday.

Celltrion’s third-quarter operating profit jumped 44.9 percent from the same period last year on stable sales of major products across the globe with an increase in the sales of new high-margin products.

The company also logged 1.03 trillion won in quarterly revenue in the same period, up 16.3 percent on-year to mark the largest third-quarter revenue in its history.

According to Celltrion, sales of high-margin products such as Remsima SC increased by 51 percent from the third quarter last year to lead the growth. The company noted that biosimilars Stoboclo-Osenvelt and Omlyclo, which became available in US and European markets in the third quarter garnered a combined revenue of over 50 billion won.

Celltrion also pointed out that the impacts from the merger with Celltrion Healthcare have reached their final stages, brewing anticipation for the acceleration of growth as well as the expansion of operating profit.

In particular, the company said its cost-of-sales ratio dropped by 9 percentage points from the third quarter last year to 39 percent due to the clearance of high-cost inventories as well as improved production and efficiency.

Celltrion added that it expects continuous growth through the end of the year and into next year. The company plans to launch high-profit products such as Eydenzelt and Stoboclo-Osenvelt in major global markets at year-end.

Celltrion’s $330 million acquisition of Eli Lilly’s biopharmaceutical manufacturing plant in New Jersey is projected to help the company better cope with US tariff threats, as the Korean firm already secured a contract manufacturing organization deal with Eli Lilly in line with the facility takeover. Celltrion plans to expand production facilities at the newly acquired US site to bolster its American local production in the future.

“With most of the merger fallout having been eased as of the third quarter, we expect another level of profit growth in the future based on the normalized cost-of-sales rate,” said a Celltrion official. “The company will put efforts into further speed up the revenue growth and performance improvement as we plan to launch new high-profit products in major global markets by the end of this year.”