Businessman Adrian Tarus, founder of the pharmaceuticals distribution company Dita, has stated that he intends to become involved in real estate as well as in a new drug distribution business, after selling Dita to the Gedeon Richter group for 14.5 million euros last year.

Whilst real estate projects could be conducted on the domestic market, a potential distribution business could only be set up outside Romania.

"My contract does not allow me to set up a distribution company in Romania. So, I will go for one of Romania's Eastern neighbours," stated Adrian Tarus.

Dita's sale is the second exit on the drug distribution market after German group ANZAG acquired 60% of Farmexpert in a similar transaction last year.

Adrian Tarus is currently the manager of Dita Import-Export Bucharest. His contract does not include any provision binding him to his position at Dita for any specific length of time. However, the same is not applicable for the Farmexpert management team, who are contracted to remain in the same positions for the next five years.

Dita was established in April 1991 and over the last few years has been among the top ten distributors in the local pharmaceuticals industry.

Negotiations with Gedeon Richter for the sale of the company started in April last year, and were completed in December, when the Hungarian group announced the acquisition of the Romanian distributor on the Budapest Stock Exchange. The total transaction was worth 14.5 million euros.

The Dita Group posted 50 million-euro turnover in 2006, and consists of three entities: Dita Import-Export, Ditafarm Impex and Dita Sud Farm. Gedeon Richter continued a series of acquisitions from the local market, after acquiring the Sibofarm distributor in early 2006. The market share held by Sibofarm was 4.5%. In comparison, Mediplus (part of the A&D Pharma group) accounte