International Expansion as growth strategy - Walgreens
International expansion prospects: Walgreens Inc.
Walgreens is currently the largest player in the American pharmacy retail industry over a century and operates around 8000 locations within the country. The firm has already undergone an international acquisition in Dec 2014 when it took over European drug store named Alliance Boots and paved the way for its presence in European and Asian markets under the name Walgreens Boots Alliance Inc (Jaspen, 2014). Before looking forward towards international presence, Walgreens reworked its product supplies network to ensure smooth operations. Walgreens has succeeded in its effort of vertical integration with AmerisourceBergen Corp, a deal which strengthens the wholesale supplies for its future pharmaceutical transactions (Sweeney, 2013).
Thus, the firm has sufficient scope of presence in European market along with its existing hold on American market and it has bolstered its back channel for uninterrupted wholesale supplies. These aspects make Walgreens most apt firm in American pharmaceutical retail industry to go for international expansion.
The American drug retailing industry has very players operating on gwlobal scale due to lack of adequate modes of foreign expansion like strategic tie-ups and vendor linkups in offshore operations. CVS health and Cardinal Health are other two main players in the industry which offer a stiff competition to Walgreens. CVS health is already in pursuit of entering into Europe via using a channeled merger with European players. Cardinal Health has already made its global presence in China and European nations and now looks forwards to a global hospital chain.
Proposed expansion strategy
As per the present stance of Walgreens in American market and its presence as Walgreens Boots Alliance Inc. in Europe and Asia, the following two-step international expansion strategy is suggested:
Landing into strategic tie-ups with e-commerce enabled pharmacy stores in emerging markets like India and China. This will give ample scope of understanding and operating in the developing economy based markets.
Acquiring national level pharmaceutical players in Asian markets to gain a far reaching span into larger markets which have immense scope of expansion.
References
Jaspen, B. (2014). Walgreens Closes Deal Begins New Era In Global Pharmacy. Forbes. Retrieved from http://www.forbes.com/sites/brucejapsen/2014/12/31/walgreens-closes-deal-begins-new-era-in-global-pharmacy/#4e8cc91e4567
Sweeney, B. (2013). Walgreen moves further away from the drugstore. Chicago Business. Retrieved from http://www.chicagobusiness.com/article/20130319/NEWS07/130319746/walgreen-moves-further-away-from-the-drugstore
