Sales jumped 9% to €36m (12% excluding currency shifts) with operating profits increasing 13% to €9.3m (16% without currency movements). Q4 revenues were up 25% to €10.27m with profits up 82% to €1.22m for the period compared to Q4 2012.
“In 2013 the sales focus for new contracts was on the BRIC countries, and it is encouraging to see that we have made real progress in nearly all of these markets,” said president Peter Rothschild.
“2014 will be a very exciting year as we look forward to interesting launches in markets like Brazil. We should also have a good possibility to build up our sales in the USA, a market we still assess to have great potential.”
Research over the year using BioGaia’s L. reuteri Prodentis strain turned in mixed results with a meta analysis and study showing benefits for colic sufferers. Another, however, showed no conclusive results for diabetes.
Oral health remained an area of focus with distribution deals with Streuli Pharma in Switzerland; Plac Control in Greece; PharmaPal Drugstore in the United Arab Emirates and George Petrou in Cyprus.
In Germany, Sunstar relaunched the Lactobacillus reuteri Prodentis-based products.
The products are available in 20 countries and come in lozenges and gums for consumers and oil drops for health professionals.
In June BioGaia paid €3.5m to take 100% control of probiotic drop producer TwoPac. It previously had a 50% stake in the 11-year-old fellow Swedish firm.
“The most important aspect of the acquisition is that it will give us unlimited access to TwoPac’s product development capacity and expertise in building customised machinery,” said Rothschild at the time.