The Birth and Development of Dainippon Pharmaceutical Company Based on “Wagasha Gojunen no Ayumi (Fifty Years of Our Company)”

<p>This paper discusses the entrepreneurship that started the Dainippon Pharmaceutical Company. Based on “Wagasha Gojuunen no Ayumi (Fifty Years of Our Company)”, the importance of drug wholesalers in Osaka, who established a pharmaceutical company by joint investment and a drug testing agency, becomes clearer.</p><p>According to the document, at the time the semi-governmental Dainippon Pharmaceutical Company was established, it was envisaged that it would ensure stable medicine supply in the case of a pandemic. This company was later acquired by Osaka Pharmaceutical Works Co., Ltd., a firm founded by drug wholesalers in Osaka. The document clarifies that medicine dealers in Osaka had concerns about the questionable quality of the medicines they stocked. Their intention to restore professional honor was clearly a factor in the founding of the company.</p><p>When they established a company to test medicines, it was insisted that testing should be a private sector activity along the lines of the situation in Europe. This document also reveals a view that the semi-governmental testing laboratory would eventually be closed down as Japan modernized, which also drove the founding of the testing company.</p><p>This energetic approach is illustrated in the lobbying of government in proposing the establishment of a pharmaceutical industry research committee during World War I. Additionally, some companies founded scholarship programs to assist the development of pharmaceutical research.</p><p>This paper further reveals the foresight, energy and leadership of medicine dealers in Osaka.</p>