Boehringer Ingelheim has compiled a list of the questions frequently asked by visitors of our website. If you do not find the answers to your queries here, contact us directly.
Our business consists of Prescription Medicines, Consumer Health Care, Industrial Customer ( Biopharmaceuticals, Pharmaceuticals Production, Pharma Chemicals) and Animal Health. We have commited ourselves to the goal of serving humankind through research into diseases and the development of new drugs and therapies.
Our major Licensing focus is in our strategic therapeutic areas:
Our chapter Licensing & Partnering informs about
The Viramune Donation Programme was inaugurated in 2000 as Boehringer Ingelheim's contribution to pMTCT in developing countries. It serves as a catalyst for building health care infrastructure and has the potential to reach out to more remote sites. The programme provides single-dose nevirapine for mother and baby free of charge for pMTCT. Where available, it should be administered with additional anti-retroviral medicine as recommended by WHO. Recent studies suggest that in women and infants previously treated with single-dose nevirapine for prevention of mother-to-child-transmission of HIV-1, the efficacy of subsequent Viramune® combination therapy may be reduced.
To apply for the Viramune® MTCT Donation Programme have a look on this website pMTCT Donation Program Website which is administered by Axios International.
On employment, Boehringer Ingelheim has received numerous awards. Our affiliated companies participate successfully in surveys evaluating Boehringer Ingelheim as employer.
Prof.* Dr Dr Andreas Barner is Chairman of the Board of Managing Director. He is also Head of Corporate Board Division Pharma Research, Development and Medicine.
* Republic of Austria
Boehringer Ingelheim GmbH as the headquarter is located in Ingelheim, the German town where the family-owned company was founded in 1885. Ingelheim is located 60 km west of Frankfurt, which is Germany's financial hub.
Ingelheim is also home of the company's German operating unit Boehringer Ingelheim Pharma GmbH & Co. KG.
All details on
The ultimate parent company of the Boehringer Ingelheim Corporation is C.H. Boehringer Sohn. Boehringer Ingelheim GmbH, which is a subsidiary of C. H. Boehringer Sohn, is the central holding company for administrative purposes - the corporate central body which manages and directs the worldwide family of Boehringer Ingelheim companies and which delivers central services to all companies of the Corporation.
Boehringer Ingelheim GmbH, our Headquarters in Ingelheim/Germany
Information needed about our affiliated companies worldwide?
Prof.* Dr Dr Andreas Barner is Chairman of the Board of Managing Director. He is also Head of Corporate Board Division Pharma Research, Development and Medicine.
* Republic of Austria
The ultimate parent company of Boehringer Ingelheim is C.H. Boehringer Sohn.
Boehringer Ingelheim has 138 affiliated companies in 47 countries.
Whatever the degree of financial control, Boehringer Ingelheim's subsidiary companies are selfmanaging and have a large degree of operational independence. They rely on Boehringer Ingelheim GmbH for strategic services and investment and make a profit contribution to the Corporation.
The Boehringer Ingelheim Corporation has voting shares, not equity shares which can be traded or listed on any stock market or index. The Corporation has been a family-owned business for nearly 125 years.
You can download a copy of the Annual Report 2008 as a pdf file
Would you like to receive printed copies of it, please contact us.
" Value through Innovation" is our Corporate vision, our headline goal.
Value through Innovation has guided and will continue to guide our way of working together. It helps us build on our strength and make the most of our distinctive character, enabling us individually and collectively to achieve great success. Our vision is the driver of our culture and allows us to meet our future challenges ahead. Our vision is derived from our Leitbild which is the heart of who we are and why we exist as Boehringer Ingelheim. "Value through Innovation" means for us analysing and anticipating the value that customers will put on our products and services and then seeking to increase it by finding new and better ways of achieving the customer's goal.
Boehringer Ingelheim traces its history directly back to 1885, when Albert Boehringer set up his chemical factory making tartaric acid salts in Ingelheim, Germany.
Find out more about the company's history.
There was a separate pharma company called Boehringer Mannheim until 1998, when it was absorbed into the Swiss company Roche. It did indeed spring from the same origins.
In 1817, Christian Friedrich Boehringer helped found a drug store and chemical laboratory in Stuttgart, which his son Christoph Heinrich moved to Mannheim in 1872. When C.H. Boehringer died in 1882, his elder son Ernst inherited the business in Mannheim, which was called C.F. Boehringer & Söhne.
Christoph Heinrich's younger son, Albert Boehringer, then set up his own chemical factory producing tartaric acid salts in Ingelheim in 1885. In 1892, he renamed this business "C.H. Boehringer Sohn" in memory of his father.
In 1892, Ernst Boehringer died, leaving the C.F. Boehringer business in the hands of his partner Dr Friedrich Engelhorn. Thus there were two pharmaceutical businesses bearing similar Boehringer names - one owned by the Boehringer family and one not.
This situation persisted until well after the World War II, when the two companies agreed to rename themselves Boehringer Ingelheim and Boehringer Mannheim in order to reduce the confusion somewhat.
On employment, Boehringer Ingelheim has received numerous awards. Our affiliated companies participate successfully in surveys evaluating Boehringer Ingelheim as employer.
In 2008, the Boehringer Ingelheim group of companies had a total mean of 41,300 employees worldwide.
Our mean total workforce by region in 2008
AAA: 6,300 (+5.2%)
Americas: 13,443 (+2.4%)
Europe (EU): 21,557 (+4.2%), incl. apprentices
Our mean total workforce by function in 2008
Production: 12,600 (30.5%)
Administration: 5,299 (12.8%)
Marketing & Sales: 15,909 (38.5%)
Research & Development: 6,788 (16.4%)
Total mean apprentices in 2008
Corporation: 704
Our business consists of Prescription Medicines, Consumer Health Care, Industrial Customer ( Biopharmaceuticals, Pharmaceuticals Production, Pharma Chemicals) and Animal Health. We have commited ourselves to the goal of serving humankind through research into diseases and the development of new drugs and therapies.
In Biopharmaceuticals the active substances like monoclonal antibodies and other therapeutic proteins are produced by cells and microorganisms, and not through chemical synthesis.
Find out more about our Biopharmaceuticals business.
For more than 25 years now, Boehringer Ingelheim has an international reputation as a reliable partner for industrial customer
Modern biotechnology is key for the discovery, development and production of innovative drugs to treat unmet medical needs. The importance of biotechnology has grown significantly since 1990, when less than 1% of all drugs were biopharmaceuticals, whereas today biopharmaceuticals represent 8%.
To maintain our strong performance in production of therapeutics derived from bacterial fermentation (Vienna, Austria) our biopharmaceuticals plant was inaugurated in 2005. In 2006, we received the successful validation.
Our Biberach site is the world's second largest plant for biopharmaceutical production of therapeutics derived from mammalian cell cultures, the production capacity has been doubled in 2003 with EUR 255 million investment.
We can now build on two FDA - and EMEA - certified production sites in Vienna, Austria, and Biberach, Germany.
Our Pharmaceuticals Production Division produces Boehringer Ingelheim's own drugs in a globally coordinated production network as well as offering manufacturing services to our industrial customer according to their specific needs
Eight world-class state of the art manufacturing facilities, operated by highly experienced personnel, offer services in three continents. The proven track record of pharmaceuticals development and wide ranges of manufacturing technologies and packaging technologies in combination with the fully harmonised supply chain network offers many possibilities for the success of our customers.
All Pharmaceuticals Production's manufacturing facilities operate in strict compliance with current good manufacturing practice (cGMP) and are inspected and certified by regulatory agencies across the globe (FDA, EMEA, MHRA, ANVISA, ASEAN). In addition, our facilities are subject to regular inspections from Boehringer Ingelheim corporate auditors, ensuring a continuous improvement and a high level of cGMP awareness.
Our Pharma Chemicals Division's core competence is manufacturing, finishing and distributing proprietary and generic active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs). In addition to synthetic products, it is also the world leader in phytochemicals - extracting active ingredients from medicinal plants.
Pharma Chemicals expertise is in providing all-round integrated solutions to customers across the pharmaceutical industry in addition to meeting Boehringer Ingelheim's own requirements.
It has five chemicals production sites in France, Germany, Spain and the USA that form an effective worldwide network. These sites offer state-of-the-art chemical development facilities, experienced chemists, analytical expertise and highly flexible, multi-purpose production plants with the capacity to upscale extremely complex chemicals from one-kilo to multi-ton levels.
Animal Health is one of our two business areas. Although small relative to our Human Pharmaceuticals business, it is growing significantly above market and showing increasingly improved profitability. Boehringer Ingelheim's Animal Health business holds an international market share of 3%, putting it in the 9th position in the market. Our research-driven expertise and human pharmaceuticals excellence ensures to contribute to a safe and nutritious food supply and helps companion animals to live a longer and healthier life. We plan to focus more on preventative solutions and aim to become world market leader with our swine biologicals.
Boehringer Ingelheim's continued success is based on solid ground - our own R&D and our partner's excellence. Our alliances range from early stage research to development and marketing or co-promotion collaborations.
Partnering is essential part of our strategy to discover and market true innovations. Our strong pipeline complemented by our partnering activities is the basis for our dynamic growth above the market.
Within the Licensing Organisation Boehringer Ingelheim has two dedicated groups for the different functions within a partnering process:
Cross-functional Licensing Advisory Teams
Headed by Licensing Advisory Team Leaders with representatives from R&D, Medicine and Marketing responsible to evaluate opportunities. The Licensing Advisory Team Leaders have broad understanding of respective indication area, dedicated to identify opportunities of potential strategic interest. Immediate involvement of a broad range of disciplines ensures early alignment and rapid decision making within Boehringer Ingelheim.
Contract and Alliance Management
Global Team located in Germany, Japan and US responsible to negotiate and manage local and international partnering agreements. Rapid and transparent deal making processes are supported by dedicated professionals, empowered by senior management. Strong focus on business and contract-related matters ensures high level of commitment and experience concerning drafting, negotiation and management of agreements.
Our major Licensing focus is in our strategic therapeutic areas:
Our chapter Licensing & Partnering informs about
Today, we carry out drug discovery in seven major therapeutic areas allocated to four major R&D sites and three support centres around the world for Human Pharmaceuticals. More than 6,700 people employed in R&D worldwide (2008) ensure a continuous flow of new compounds to come into pre-development and development. Find out more about Research & Development at Boehringer Ingelheim.
Drug discovery, pre-clinical and clinical development take about 12 - 15 years and including failures an investment of in average US$ 1 billion. Every year, Boehringer Ingelheim invests about a fifth of its net sales in Prescription Medicines into research and development. The phases in the process from idea to patient are:
Over the past few years we have seen fast-paced developments in the opportunities to explore human genomic codes and its relation to diseases. Knowledge about the genetic structure and principles of the human body opens the door for the identification of new targets for innovative therapies.
Genetic research and modification are understood as opportunities to develop therapies to fight diseases that are so far only hardly treatable or untreatable. Carefully and respectfully approaching these opportunities, Boehringer Ingelheim is interested in research and development in gene therapy.
We encourage genetic research, because we believe that all avenues of progress towards better human and animal health deserve to be explored.
However, we recognise the concerns over the possible long-term consequences of genetic modification and cloning. We are guided by extreme caution in these new and explorative research areas. We strongly adhere to our philosophy that no irreversible modification should be done until is proven to be safe.
Boehringer Ingelheim strictly opposes any manipulation of the germ line or gene therapy with germ line cells.
Boehringer Ingelheim has a general policy of transparency with publications of clinical trial results. We recognize that there are important public health benefits associated with making clinical trial information more widely available to healthcare professionals and patients. Such disclosure, however, must maintain protections for intellectual property and contract rights as well as conform to the regulations in relevant countries.
Boehringer Ingelheim supports the joint global position of the research-based pharmaceutical industry published by the International Federation of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers and Associations (IFPMA) on 06 January 2005, updated on 18 November 2008, and is committed to the agreed principles.
The disclosure process is based upon the requirements outlined in the global industry position paper of the IFPMA, the requirements by the United States Food and Drug Administration Amendments Act of 2007 (FDAAA), and the United States state of Maine law regarding the Reporting Requirements for Pharmaceutical Manufacturers and Labelers for approved products marketed in the state of Maine.
The HIV/AIDS pandemic is destroying lives and deteriorating living conditions all over the globe; 95% of people living with HIV/AIDS are in the developing world with limited access to life saving anti-retroviral drugs. At the end of 2006 more than 75% of patients in need of drugs in sub-Saharan Africa did not receive adequate treatment. In addition, only 10% of children born to HIV positive mothers benefit from interventions to prevent the mother-to-child transmission.
The Accelerating Access Initiative is a cooperative endeavor of seven research-based pharmaceutical companies including Boehringer Ingelheim, UN agencies and the World Bank. The initiative started in 2000 and by June 2006, the treatments delivered by the Accelerating Access Initiative in developing countries were reaching more than 750,000 patients.
The participants of the initiative are committed to working with governments, international organisations and other stakeholders to find ways to broaden access while ensuring rational, effordable, safe and effective use of drugs for HIV/AIDS-related illnesses.
The Viramune Donation Programme was inaugurated in 2000 as Boehringer Ingelheim's contribution to pMTCT in developing countries. It serves as a catalyst for building health care infrastructure and has the potential to reach out to more remote sites. The programme provides single-dose nevirapine for mother and baby free of charge for pMTCT. Where available, it should be administered with additional anti-retroviral medicine as recommended by WHO. Recent studies suggest that in women and infants previously treated with single-dose nevirapine for prevention of mother-to-child-transmission of HIV-1, the efficacy of subsequent Viramune® combination therapy may be reduced.
To apply for the Viramune® MTCT Donation Programme have a look on this website pMTCT Donation Program Website which is administered by Axios International.
To increase access to anti-retrovirals in the developing and emerging economies, Boehringer Ingelheim has also participated in initiatives with other organisations, such as:
Furthermore, Boehringer Ingelheim is running different training activities, for example
More detailed information about Boehringer Ingelheims partnerships in developing or emerging countries: IFPMA – Health Partnerships: Developing World
The wording "podcast" derives from the english "broadcasting" and the name of the mp3-Player "iPod".
A podcast is a multimedia file that is distributed over the Internet for playback on portable hardware such as iPod, mp3-Player, mobile phones and computers. Boehringer Ingelheim offers special video files also as podcasts.
To view a podcast one is required to download the individual podcast or to subscribe to a podcast series.
Please install a podcatcher, a software which is capable of searching the web to find the latest podcast and which automatically delivers it to your computer.
Please add the feed address you find on the webpage and paste it into your podcast software. The feed is really just the address of the podcast. How you do this will depend on your software, but you should look out for buttons or links that say "Add" or "Subscribe". When a new video/audio file becomes available for the podcast you have subscribed to, your software will automatically download it. For audio, you can then listen to it on your computer or transfer it to your portable player to listen to it later. Note that for video, it should play on your computer but may only play on certain portable players and mobile phones able to receive mp4 formats.
Really Simple Syndication (RSS) is a format designed for sharing web content. RSS news feeds are free content feeds that contain headlines, articles and links to websites.They deliver news and features directly to you, so you don't have to visit each webpage separately and you can request the information when you want it
To receive and display RSS feeds, you need a newsreader or aggregator. This is a piece of software that checks RSS feeds and lets you read them. There are two possibilities to access RSS news feeds: online by using a browser or on your desktop with a downloadable application.
RSS via Browser:
Many browsers provide integrated support for RSS feeds. With them you can easily bookmark your favourite news feeds and read it online like a website. A list of various browsers is available at the
Google Directory. For more details on these functionality and information about your browser, please check their websites.
RSS application software:
Special RSS-aware programs running on your desktop are available for various operating systems. After downloading and installing the application software, you can read, organize and archive your favourite RSS news feeds. A list of various newsreaders is available at the
Yahoo Directory.