The main Irish arm of biopharma giant Sanofi last year paid out dividends of €800 million.
Accounts show that Sanofi subsidiary Genzyme Ireland Ltd paid out the dividend as pretax profits increased by 6.5 per cent to €328.5 million.
Revenues declined by 8 per cent in 2024 from €1.78 billion to €1.65 billion.
Sanofi purchased Genzyme’s global business in 2011 and since then has invested over €700 million in the Waterford facility.
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Genzyme is one of the largest private employers in the southeast where employee numbers further increased in 2024 from 905 to 959.
In October of last year, Waterford native, Cian O’Brien was appointed site head at Sanofi Waterford and replaced Kilkenny native Amy Brennan who departed her Waterford post to a new role as head of rare disease, oncology & immunology (RDOI) for Sanofi.
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Mr O’Brien joined the Waterford team as a project engineer in 2003 and was a member of the site leadership team since 2019.
The directors state that Genzyme’s turnover decreased “due to the product mix and transfer prices across the group”.
The workforce at the Waterford site is made up of 345 in manufacturing, 318 in quality, research and development, 142 in administration, 84 in engineering and 70 in materials.
Underlining the contribution of the Waterford site to the local economy, staff costs last year increased from €90.1 million to €99.9 million that included share based payments of €2.12 million.
Pay to directors last year increased from €475,000 to €551,000 made up of emoluments and €515,000 and pension contributions of €36,000.
The company recorded post tax profits of €281.39 million after incurring a corporation tax charge of €47.12 million.
The corporation tax charge included a €7.8 million “domestic top up tax charge”. A note states that “the company is subject to domestic top-up tax under Pillar Two tax legislation. The top-up tax relates to the company’s operations in Ireland”.
Established in Waterford in 2001, Sanofi Waterford is a primary distribution centre for many of the firm’s major treatments.
The firm also provides debt financing services to other Sanofi group entities.
The revenues were generated by €1.44 billion in pharma sales and interest received from group undertakings amounting to €212.63 million.
The firm’s spend in R&D last year decreased from €13 million to €12.8 million while combined non-cash depreciation and impairment costs totalled €33.34 million.
