Australia’s pharmaceutical industry is behind one of the first significant electronic commerce projects to emerge in the country. Wholesalers Faulding Healthcare, Sigma, HAS Trading, WH Soul Pattinson, and Australian Pharmaceutical Industries will all participate in the Pharmacy Extranet Gateway, developed as part of the Pharmaceutical Electronic Commerce and Communication Project, PECC. The system will enable hospitals and wholesalers to trade directly with suppliers. This business stream is thought to be worth around $3.3bn per year. Patrick Gallagher, PECC’s project director, hopes to have 450 manufacturers on deck in the system’s first year of operation. For hospitals, the attraction of the project will lie in the reduced cost of purchase orders – around $3.30, down from the current $33.30-$50 – and the ability to say goodbye to waste. Gallagher estimates that 15% of consumables now making their way into the hospital system, disappear through theft or shrinkage. Introducing a system whereby bar-coded consumables were ordered over the internet would reduce this figure. Accompanying the Melbourne launch of PECC was a report written by Price Waterhouse and the Department of Industry, Science and Tourism which claims that introducing electronic commerce into the healthcare supply chain could save $227m a year.
