Main aspects of product portfolio management in the pharmaceutical company. Methods of the product mix structuring

Sartbayeva Yerkezhan

Resident of General Surgery in Kazakh-Russian medical university

By and large approaches to strategic management of a variety of goods, considered in the literature, boiled down to nomenclature structuring, followed by analysis of trade groups. Some authors in the description of the categories set of product mix trade names used the term assortment matrix [1].

According to the definition of Kiselev V.M., assortment matrix is "structurally and quantitatively planned product portfolio, systematically presented in the form of product categories, product groups and brands, taking into account their demand for the end user" [2]. In the literature, various methods of the creation of the assortment matrix and recommendations for trade organizations on their adaptation, taking into account the specifics of the market, were offered. The structure of the product mix was evaluated and adjusted according to six criteria: content, extension, modification, elimination, emphasis, contrast of the price. In another study the main emphasis was made on the evaluation of the selection criteria, on the basis of which the buyer decides to purchase goods [3]. The questions of the application of more complicated methods in the management system of the product mix in trade organizations were reflected in some special studies. As examples variants of approbation of the classical portfolio theory of Markovits and analysis of the practical difficulties in the construction of a strategic matrix (BCG matrix). It is noted that the difficulties in implementing well-proven abroad approaches to product mix management were often associated with insufficiency or uncertainty of numerical characteristics of commodity markets [2]. Herewith the main focus in determination the compositional analysis of the business units was put against each category of the buyers’ concrete demands. In the organizational plan, all the stages of goods movement were organized and managed by a single point of responsibility – category manager.

This task is particularly relevant for the pharmaceutical market, which has its own specific: the wide range of goods (several tens of thousands of names), the seasonal nature of demand, and the high level of competition. Thus, in determination the boundaries of product categories investigators offered to take into account certain commodity relationships and / or interchangeability of products to best meet of customer needs [3]. The second principle, which provides the ability to analyze the management efficiency - is the comparability of the categories against each other on the share of revenue total of the organization.

In practice, organizations of wholesale trade with a wide product mix at the forming of product portfolio as a criterion for division the results of the ABC or XYZ – analysis, price segmentation or, even easier, the manufacturer's name were usually used. However, such approaches to the formation of the assortment matrix were quite formal and didn’t take into account the peculiarities of the pharmaceutical company activities. In general, one of the main tasks in the reduction to practice of any structured system of stock management was the task of the correct definition in commodity groups.

Method of the ABC analysis in its classical form is very wide represented in the practice of trade organizations in order to allocate the product categories and their further management. As the development of the classical method, from time to time researchers offered various modifications of the ABC analysis (ABCDE-analysis, the use of different approaches to the defining the boundaries of groups, etc.). XYZ-analysis was used rarely in the practice of multiproduct trade organizations. The literature reflects the experience of the classic variant of XYZ-analysis, as well as a variety of approaches to the calculation of the parameters and the definition of the boundary conditions. XYZ-analysis was used integrated with ABC analysis more often in practice of trade and manufacturing organizations.

VEN-analysis refers to the methods, widely used in the Kazakhstani and foreign pharmaceutical practice for grouping the drugs. VEN-analysis refers to the separation of the commodity nomenclature into three categories in terms of the vital buyer’s need: vital, necessary and secondary products. The use of grouping methods, based on the concept of the product life cycle, gave a good account on itself in practical marketing activities. However, to the priority area of this method of analysis, as, indeed, and the BCG matrix, does not include activities of trade and production. However, the activity of not commercial, but industrial enterprises is a priority field of application of this analysis method, as, indeed, and the BCG matrix.

Dynamical model of product mix, based on the seasonal characteristics of the goods, was also presented in the literature. Nomenclature management in this system was carried out by the change of strategies in each season for different commodity categories; herewith the choice of management methods was carried out with the help of cost-effectiveness analysis of the system. The issues of product mix grouping were discussed in some works depending on the pricing characteristics of the goods. The use of original pricing strategy for each category was put as a basic principle of grouping. Thus for example the following commodity groups with wide variation of increase of prices were marked out in one of the variants of practical realization of these approaches: loss leaders, basic commodities, flow goods, complimentary goods and others. The other grouping in commodity nomenclature, mostly used in analytical studies of trade markets, was the combination of the goods with similar price into price segments. It was also possible to consider the method of product mix analysis of the competitors, distributors, inventory shortage monitoring and unsatisfied demand as a original way of forming the categories.

List of used literature:

1. Kaysheva, N.SH. Analiz bezubytochnosti realizatsii aptekami nestabil'no potreblyayemykh lekarstvennykh sredstv / N.SH. Kaysheva, B.P. Buchnev, G.V.Smolenskaya // Farmatsiya. - 2012. - № 8. - S. 24-26.

2. Kiselev, V.M. Metodologiya upravleniya assortimentom tovara v integrirovannykh torgovykh kanalakh / V.M Kiselev // Upravleniye kanalami distributsii.- 2006.- № 2. S. 120-130.

3. Kozlovskiy, V.A. Logisticheskiy menedzhment / V.A. Kozlovskiy, E.A. Kozlovskaya, N.T. Savrukov.- SPB .: Izd-vo «Lan'», 2002.- 272 s.