Tsumura traces herb procurement back to the cost of cultivation
Tsumura is a pharmaceutical company focused on prescription Kampo medicines, made from natural medicinal ingredients known as crude drugs. It makes extract powder, granulates and packages it, and supplies medical institutions through pharmaceutical distributors and wholesalers.
In Tsumura’s procurement model, cultivation and purchase prices are connected. It defines self-managed fields as those where it can directly guide cultivation, understand its costs and set purchase prices based on them.
Understand growing costs before setting purchase prices
The purpose includes stabilizing crude-drug quality and prices. Tsumura attributes a relatively stable procurement-price index to expanding self-managed fields. It also identifies bringing wild crude drugs into cultivation, increasing yields and automating processing as areas of work.
DATA VIEW
Three years of crude-drug procurement prices
Company-defined, usage-weighted price index; FY2006 = 100. Bars start at 0. FY2023, FY2024 and FY2025 end in March 2024, March 2025 and March 2026, respectively.
Procurement in the field connects with Kampo manufacturing
Guide cultivation, understand its costs and buy crude drugs, then sort and process them into medicines.
1Know the field and its costs
At self-managed fields, Tsumura can directly guide cultivation and set purchase prices from growing costs.
2Sort and blend crude drugs
Sorting machines operate at Ishioka and Yubari. A blending-instruction system also supports the movement into production.
3Powder, granules and packs
Extract-powder manufacturing is followed by granulation and packaging. Raw materials and work in process also form inventory.
Plants, equipment and layout are schematic. Not every process, material or site is shown. Self-managed fields do not mean the land is owned by Tsumura.
Extract-powder manufacturing and granulation and packaging are further stages. The May 2026 investment plan identifies these separately from crude-drug storage capacity (results presentation, PDF p.47).
Maintain reserves while keeping materials moving
In May 2026, the company still included both improved operational CCC and additional inventory for business continuity in its operating-cash-flow plan, with opposite effects on cash (results transcript, PDF p.38). The task is to move materials into production while retaining necessary reserves.
CONCEPT MAP
Different work from field to finished medicine
A summary of Tsumura's disclosed procurement and manufacturing activities.
Secure Kampo's raw materialsProcurement and processing
FieldsGuide cultivation directly and understand growing costs
Purchase pricesSet prices using that knowledge of cultivation costs
Factories and stockSort and blend materials while balancing supply with appropriate inventory
Self-managed fields do not establish land ownership. The map does not attribute price or inventory improvements to one measure alone. Sources: May 2026 presentation p.46; May 2025 presentation pp.12, 37 and 54.
THE VIEW AFTER THE NUMBERS
What the numbers suggest
Tsumura extends procurement into understanding how crude drugs are grown and what cultivation costs. It uses that knowledge in setting purchase prices, then sorts and blends the materials as they move toward finished products.
Secure the inputs, and turn them efficiently into the products needed. The procurement-price index and raw-material inventory reveal these two parts of supplying Kampo medicines.
Azbil combines sensors, valves and control systems to adjust airflow and when heating and cooling equipment operates. Alongside testing technology in its own building, it offers services that use customers’ operating data to propose improvements and assess the results. In the year ended March 2026, BA sales rose 5.1% despite lower new-building sales, and segment profit grew 18.6%. Control, renovation and service work continue after a building is completed.
