1. Introduction to Medical E-commerce
The pharmaceutical industry is one of the special industries in China, which is directly related to people's health and life safety. The pharmaceutical industry is also one of the four key technological innovation industries (computer, automobile, medicine and microelectronics) in China. It is an international industry with high technology intensity, large investment, good benefit, long cycle and high risk. However, due to various unreasonable factors in China's existing production and circulation field, the order of drug production and operation is chaotic, and unhealthy practices such as bribery, bribery and kickbacks are prevalent in drug purchase and sale. Similar problems also occurred in medical and health units, which made patients bear a heavy burden of drug costs. In order to put an end to the above phenomenon, the state has repeatedly applied for establishing orderly competition in the industry, standardizing industry management and strengthening supervision of circulation links. However, it is not enough to regulate market behavior only from the aspects of laws and regulations. We must enhance the transparency and management monitoring of the pharmaceutical market through advanced means, that is, modern e-commerce means, vigorously strengthen the informatization construction of the industry, link the government, the market and consumers together, and finally realize the healthy development of the pharmaceutical circulation market and protect the interests of consumers. Through e-commerce technology, a virtual market covering the whole process of drug purchase and sale will be established, so that buyers and sellers in drug circulation will face a fair and transparent market channel equally. All drug purchase and sale behaviors in this channel will be recorded by modern information collection means, and after corresponding information processing, it will become the basis for law enforcement and supervision of relevant government departments at all levels. The formation of this market channel and the corresponding trading mode can not only improve the efficiency of drug circulation and reduce the cost of drug circulation, but also have the same significance to standardize the unfair competition in drug production, circulation and sales in China.
2. Management of pharmaceutical virtual market
First of all, the medical virtual market must be a legal market, and both parties trading in this market must also have legal qualifications. Therefore, the management of medical virtual market should be carried out under the framework of traditional medical market management, and modern management science should be used for innovation and development. Secondly, as a product of market economy, medical virtual market must be independent of any government department. The management of medical virtual market by relevant government departments is mainly reflected in the qualification identification in advance and supervision afterwards, and government departments should not directly participate in the operation of virtual market. At the same time, based on the principle of fair trade, the operators of the virtual market platform shall not be directly linked to the drug trading income. Therefore, the operators of the virtual market platform should not be the two sides of the drug transaction, but should be borne by an independent third party, and make profits by providing services related to the transaction. The management of medical virtual market is mainly based on modern information technology. Under the framework of traditional pharmaceutical market management, the legal qualifications of the two parties to the transaction and the third-party information intermediaries operating the virtual market platform are identified, and the transaction process is monitored in real time and the transaction results are reviewed afterwards, so as to effectively manage the pharmaceutical circulation market and accelerate the standardized construction of China's pharmaceutical circulation market.
3. Breakthrough direction of pharmaceutical virtual market
Since the perfection of medical virtual market is the product of a process, it is necessary to break through from a certain point of buyers and sellers, which is manifested in the system platform, that is, starting with online sales or online procurement. A notable feature of China's current pharmaceutical market is the buyer's market. The purchasing behavior of hospitals accounts for more than 85% of the whole pharmaceutical purchasing behavior, and the purchasing mode of hospitals greatly affects the operation of the pharmaceutical market. Therefore, the promotion of medical virtual market starts with hospital procurement, which can really affect the mode of drug trading and make the application of medical virtual market step by step.
4. Analysis of pharmaceutical market benefits
(1) Social welfare
Purify the market to ensure the quality of drugs and the safety and effectiveness of clinical medication;
Standardize the purchase and sale behavior and curb unhealthy practices in drug purchase and sale activities;
Promote the separate accounting and management of medicine, cut off the economic interest relationship between medical institutions and drug marketing, and create conditions for the implementation of the basic medical insurance system for employees;
It is conducive to improving market concentration and speeding up the reform of pharmaceutical circulation system.
(2) Economic benefits
Hospital: drug income has increased significantly;
Inventory is reduced, capital turnover is accelerated, and the level of informatization is improved;
Market competitiveness has increased.
Enterprise: the rapid rise of large companies;
The transaction cost is reduced and the profit space is expanded;
The business environment has improved, and business is better than before.
5. Overview of B2B mode of medical e-commerce.
Medical e-commerce is a business activity that takes medical institutions, pharmaceutical wholesale enterprises, banks, pharmaceutical production enterprises, medical information service providers and insurance companies as network members, and provides users with safe, reliable, open and easy-to-maintain medical trade services through the Internet network application platform. Among them, B2B mode, as one of the modes in medical e-commerce, is defined as: pharmaceutical production enterprises and pharmaceutical wholesale enterprises conduct Internet drug transactions with other enterprises other than their own members through their own websites.
6. Development of B2B model of pharmaceutical e-commerce in developed countries.
The United States, as the birthplace of e-commerce, is an early country in drug e-commerce, and the government actively supports the development of drug e-commerce. After more than ten years of development, the medical e-commerce in the United States has been continuously deepened and improved, forming a situation in which B2B(BusinesstoBusiness), B2C(BusinesstoConsumer) and third-party medical e-commerce trading platforms coexist. And through the developed third-party logistics network to complete the distribution and distribution of drugs. The B2B model of American medical e-commerce is mainly developed by large pharmaceutical wholesalers and pharmaceutical enterprises. At present, there are five first-class wholesalers in the United States, among which ——Ameris0urceBergen, CardinalHealth and Mckesson account for 96% of the market.
The research report of forest Market Research Company, a well-known consulting company, shows that in the United States, the Internet has saved the pharmaceutical market with annual sales of $83 billion, as high as 1 1 billion. By 2005, the BtoBtal amount of e-commerce transactions in American pharmaceutical industry has increased from $6.4 billion in 199 to $430 billion, among which the electronic transactions connecting suppliers with hospitals, pharmacies and outpatient departments will reach $124 billion, and the transactions of online diagnosis and online pharmacies will reach $22 billion. This report predicts that medical e-commerce will have a huge impact on the pharmaceutical circulation industry. Statistics show that American BtoB accounts for 85% of e-commerce sales, while BtoC accounts for less than 15% of e-commerce sales. The rapid development of e-commerce in the United States is largely due to the strong support of the government and the introduction of relevant laws and regulations.
In Japan, trade associations have played an important role in promoting the development of pharmaceutical e-commerce. Japan Pharmaceutical Enterprises Association has established a drug trading network for pharmaceutical enterprises to trade raw materials and raw materials. Japan's medical wholesalers association has played a decisive role in formulating data exchange interface standards and standard drug codes, laying the foundation for the extensive development of BtoB medical e-commerce in Japan. In Europe, the process of EU's unified market will continue to advance, the pharmaceutical industry will experience frequent and fierce mergers and acquisitions, and the development of pharmaceutical e-commerce will also gain greater opportunities. At present, the mainstream form of medical e-commerce in Europe is still BtoB, which is still an enterprise-level application and a third-party medical e-commerce platform with no extensive influence. The application of BtoB e-commerce in the field of medicine has greatly expanded the business space of pharmaceutical enterprises. Whether it is a pharmaceutical enterprise or a pharmaceutical wholesale enterprise, formulate appropriate e-commerce.
Strategy has become an important part of their enterprise strategy. The emergence of third-party e-commerce platforms, such as GHX in the United States and GHX in Japan, provides opportunities for small and medium-sized enterprises to explore the global market and reduces the overall social cost of developing pharmaceutical e-commerce. The successful experience of B2B mode of pharmaceutical e-commerce in Europe and America has three basic inspirations for China's pharmaceutical industry: the level of informatization construction of pharmaceutical enterprises is high; The strong support of the government and the promulgation of relevant laws and regulations; The extensive application of the third party logistics.
7. Development of B2B mode of medical e-commerce in China 1. The main characteristics of China's medical e-commerce In view of China's national conditions, including the industrial structure of the pharmaceutical industry, the current situation of market-oriented construction, and the legal and regulatory environment, the development of China's medical e-commerce also presents its own characteristics compared with developed countries in the world. These functions mainly include:
① On the whole, the application of e-commerce is scattered, the development level is not high, and the scale of the companies employed is small.
② From the application depth, it mainly stays at the information service level, and there are few complete e-commerce services.
③ From the business model, the development of online pharmacies is limited, and online wholesale business has become the mainstream of e-commerce applications. 1, BtoB mode medical electronic transaction is mainly partially realized in centralized bidding and purchasing of drugs. In recent years, China's online medical electronic transactions have also shown a good development momentum. In 2003, Haihong Holdings undertook drug bidding projects, with a total purchase of 6.678 billion yuan, and realized online drug transactions of 3.002 billion yuan, almost half of its total transaction amount. At the same time, the total procurement volume of centralized bidding procurement projects for medical devices reached 654.38+0.75 billion yuan. In 2004, nearly 8 billion yuan of drug purchases were completed on Haihong's medical e-commerce platform. Although the online transaction volume of BtoB's medical e-commerce accounts for a very low proportion of the total annual transaction volume, it has great growth potential. In 2003, the online transaction volume reached 1.096 of the annual transaction volume. Taking Shanghai Pharmaceutical Trading Network as an example, within eight months of its official operation, the online transaction volume has exceeded1.500,000 yuan.
8. Analysis of the problems of medical e-commerce in China 1. The overall development level is not high. According to the survey conducted by the National Information Center, in the answer of "the main purpose of the enterprise website", the surveyed pharmaceutical enterprises take it as 1 17%, and the "website has not been built" accounts for184%. 247% choose to publish information and contact customers at the same time, 155% choose to publish information, contact customers and negotiate business at the same time: the proportion of online sales, online purchase or online payment is less than 3%. The above data shows that the overall level of medical e-commerce in China is not high. At present, there is still a considerable gap in the overall construction and application level of e-commerce compared with European and American counterparts with high level of informatization. 2. The relevant policies and regulations are not perfect. The further development of medical e-commerce still lacks a perfect legal support environment. The laws and regulations issued in recent years only pay attention to some marginalized legal issues in the development of e-commerce, such as infrastructure, information services, administration and so on. The core issues in the operation of e-commerce, such as electronic transactions, the legal effect of electronic contracts, the legal relationship between parties in online payment, the protection of data and privacy, etc. , less involved in the effectiveness and security of trading links, the protection of the rights and interests of interested parties and other issues. Therefore, it is necessary to legislate in the field of medical e-commerce and establish the legal order of medical e-commerce market scientifically and effectively. 3. Information flow and capital flow logistics are not effectively integrated. Electronic commerce consists of information flow, capital flow and logistics. On the one hand, due to both sides' doubts about the security of online payment and the lack of relevant legal protection, domestic B2B medical e-commerce companies are currently "online negotiation and offline payment". On the other hand, in the field of pharmaceutical circulation in China, the situation of large number, small scale, scattered market and low efficiency of circulation enterprises has not fundamentally changed. In the field of pharmaceutical circulation in China, the large-scale logistics distribution center covering the whole country is still in the construction stage. Due to the above two factors, the information flow, capital flow and logistics in B2B medical e-commerce in China are not coherent and cannot be effectively integrated. Therefore, the application value of e-commerce is reduced, and the efficient circulation of medical commodities cannot be realized. 4. The national logistics network is scattered. China pharmaceutical market can be basically divided into seven regions: East China (Yangtze River Delta logistics circle), South China (Pearl River Delta logistics circle), North China (Zhengzhou logistics circle, Beijing-Tianjin-Tangshan logistics circle), Northeast China (Bohai Rim logistics circle), Southwest China (Chongqing-Chengdu logistics circle), Central China (Wuhan logistics circle) and Northwest China (Xi 'an and Lanzhou logistics circle). Although each region is developing its own logistics network, some large pharmaceutical companies are also implementing their own "national distribution" expansion plans. However, the logistics networks among regions are independent of each other. Enterprise's own logistics network can't share "overlapping resources" with regional logistics, resulting in unnecessary waste of resources. Therefore, it hinders the role of medical e-commerce in improving the speed of drug circulation.
9. The optional B2B mode of medical e-commerce in China is 1. The enterprise informatization model is modeled after the developed countries in Europe and America, and developed by stages with the help of enterprise informatization construction. After highly informatization, the electronic trading market in the field of pharmaceutical circulation in China started.
In view of the management level of Chinese pharmaceutical enterprises, the market economy situation and China's medical and health system, it is impossible to realize the inter-enterprise e-commerce model supported by enterprise informatization in a short time, and it must be implemented step by step. Generally, it goes through: the preparation stage of pharmaceutical enterprise informatization; Establish an integrated management system and internal network for internal integration of pharmaceutical enterprises; Establish an e-commerce application system for pharmaceutical enterprises, and fully realize the three stages of informatization and e-commerce for pharmaceutical enterprises. The application of enterprise e-commerce is to establish a perfect intranet and realize the secure connection with the Internet. On this basis, an e-commerce application system is added to conduct e-commerce transactions.
This model is characterized by steady development and synchronization with the development of national informatization, but it has high cost, many restrictive factors and slow development speed. 2. Industry Alliance Exchange Model Industry Alliance Exchange (Consortiumtrad—ingexchangeCTE) is a super electronic market composed of some large enterprises in the industry, which brings their suppliers and customers together, thus greatly improving the operational efficiency of each enterprise. In April 2005, the "China Pharmaceutical Commercial Economic Union" initiated by five major pharmaceutical commercial companies was formally announced. Alliance is located in five central cities: Beijing, Tianjin, Shanghai, Chongqing and Guangzhou, all of which are leading enterprises in regional pharmaceutical business. As the most important alliance of China pharmaceutical industry so far. If all enterprises can use the existing B2B platform to set up an industry alliance exchange, it will undoubtedly become an important force to standardize the cooperation between emerging medical e-commerce and traditional Chinese medicine B2B field. 3. Leap-forward third-party electronic trading market model The key point of this model is that the e-commerce of China pharmaceutical industry can develop by leaps and bounds, that is, China pharmaceutical industry enterprises do not need to imitate the western pharmaceutical industry, but can realize leap-forward development through complete third-party electronic service providers on the road of gradually improving the informationization of enterprises, hospitals and pharmaceutical circulation enterprises. Pharmaceutical enterprises, drug distributors, hospitals and government departments can conduct complete transactions and industry supervision on the electronic trading platform provided by third parties.
10, future development strategy and countermeasures
According to the requirements of Scientific Outlook on Development, closely centering on the central task of transforming economic growth mode and improving comprehensive competitiveness, we should implement system innovation, strive to create a good environment for the development of pharmaceutical e-commerce, actively promote the informatization construction of pharmaceutical enterprises, popularize the application of e-commerce, speed up the reform of pharmaceutical circulation system, implement the leap-forward development strategy, and take the guiding ideology of the development road of pharmaceutical e-commerce with China characteristics. The government promotes the combination with the leading role of pharmaceutical companies. Improve the management system, optimize the policy environment, strengthen infrastructure construction, improve service quality, give full play to the main role of pharmaceutical enterprises in e-commerce applications, establish a benign interaction mechanism between the government and enterprises, and coordinate the development of pharmaceutical e-commerce. 1. Independent third-party electronic market is a model that conforms to China's national conditions. GHX is an independent third-party electronic trading market in the United States, which is developed based on the environment and conditions of fewer traders and higher market concentration. It belongs to vertical market operators and trading cooperation platforms. Mainly driven by the seller, so the interests are usually biased towards the seller, so the degree of fairness is not very high. Due to the large number of traders in China's pharmaceutical market and low market concentration, China's pharmaceutical circulation e-commerce can completely cross the seller's or buyer's dominant stage and directly take the road of independent third party according to China's actual situation. Starting from the realization of centralized online procurement and order processing, we will gradually establish and improve supervision, payment, logistics and other systems to achieve backwardness.
Establishing a third-party medical electronic market covering the whole industry is a development trend on the one hand, and also meets the needs of China's medical and health development on the other. At the same time, it is also determined by the particularity of medicine. As China's market economy is not fully developed, the establishment of a modern medical virtual market with the help of e-commerce is a promotion to the healthy development of the medical market. From this point of view, the improvement of China's medical virtual market is bound to be the product of a process. At the same time, some people have become vested interests because of the disadvantages of the primary stage of the development of the existing market economy, so they will inevitably resist the promotion of virtual markets. Therefore, at present, the promotion and perfection of China's virtual market cannot rely solely on the spontaneous power of the market, but requires strong administrative intervention and support, as well as the active participation of all sectors of society. So it must also be a systematic project of the whole society led by the government.
The third-party electronic market in China should be a legal market, and both parties who trade in this market must also have legal qualifications. In addition, as a product of market economy, the medical electronic market must be independent of any government department. The management of medical electronic trading market by relevant government agencies is mainly reflected in pre-qualification and post-event supervision, and government departments should not directly participate in the operation of the market platform. At the same time, based on the principle of fair trade, the operators of virtual market platforms should not be directly linked to the income from medical transactions. Therefore, the operators of the virtual market platform should not be the two sides of the medical transaction, but should be undertaken by an independent third party to make profits by providing services related to the transaction.
A notable feature of the current pharmaceutical market in China is the buyer's market, and the market in which the buyer does not participate is often wishful thinking. The procurement behavior of hospitals in China accounts for more than 80% of the whole medical procurement behavior, and the procurement mode of hospitals greatly affects the operation of the medical market. Therefore, the promotion and application of independent third-party electronic trading market must start with the procurement of hospitals, so as to really affect the mode of medical transactions. 2. Market environment and system construction of medical e-commerce. The establishment and development of independent third-party electronic trading market is a complex social system engineering, involving the construction of information infrastructure (such as the application of network technology, the Internet and the construction of enterprise internal information systems, etc.). ), as well as business credit, online payment, certification, standards, logistics and distribution, taxation and other environmental and institutional construction, as well as the formulation and revision of relevant laws. The development of e-commerce is restricted by two factors, one is the popularization and application of information technology and the foundation and level of enterprise internal informatization; The second is the market environment and system construction. The latter constraint is more obvious. Looking at the development of e-commerce in China in recent years, the main factors restricting the development of e-commerce are not technical problems, but the required market environment and institutional arrangements. It is difficult for general business to adapt to the market environment and system, and it is even more difficult for e-commerce to adapt. To this end, the key or starting point for the government to promote the development of e-commerce is to promote the market environment and system construction. 3. Cultivating a mature third-party logistics e-commerce model requires a complete logistics distribution system, and the reform in the field of pharmaceutical circulation calls for professional pharmaceutical third-party logistics services. Third-party logistics refers to the logistics operation mode that professional logistics service enterprises complete logistics services except the supply and demand sides of commodities.
The service quality provided by the third-party logistics enterprises in the pharmaceutical market is not only related to the demand side (hospital) and the supply side (pharmaceutical factory), but also directly affects the interests of patients. Therefore, our government must reasonably manage, correctly guide and moderately supervise the third-party logistics enterprises in the pharmaceutical market, so that the logistics work can be carried out in a healthy and orderly manner.
At present, pharmaceutical wholesalers and pharmaceutical retail chain enterprises at the provincial, prefecture and county levels should actively reorganize into regional pharmaceutical distribution centers on the basis of using existing logistics resources, and actively join the network of the higher-level pharmaceutical logistics centers in their respective regions to become logistics node enterprises. This can reduce the wholesale level of pharmaceutical wholesale enterprises, directly guide market terminals through the network of logistics distribution centers, and effectively realize the flattening of drug circulation channels. Make full use of modern information technology to effectively connect customers, distribution centers, logistics centers and suppliers. 4. Integrate existing resources and establish a nationwide third-party electronic trading network. First, standardize and unify technical standards such as product coding and management coding within enterprises, and realize system integration and resource sharing within enterprises. Secondly, a unified national strategic management system has been established, which has achieved the unification of business processes, trading rules and data standards, laying a foundation for realizing the national access to data resources. Thirdly, the seven regional network blocks are interconnected and integrated on a large scale to form a high degree of information sharing, so that logistics and product information can be unimpeded throughout the country. Through the above three steps, we will strive to establish a national B2B medical e-commerce network.
Although a few pharmaceutical enterprises have developed the embryonic form of the third-party electronic trading market from drug bidding and purchasing, the overall level of China in this field is still in the primary stage. Under the macro-environment that the country encourages the development of e-commerce, the government will formulate relevant policies, learn from the successful experience of European and American countries in this field, and combine China's national conditions to standardize and develop B2B medical e-commerce in China. China's national unified electronic trading market is certainly just around the corner.