Multinational pharma employees in Korea earn over ₩100M on average

Analysis of 27 Korean subsidiaries… 21 companies exceed KRW 100M average salary

Impact of voluntary retirement and workforce restructuring… disparities between companies remain

Last year, the average annual salary of employees at Korean subsidiaries of major multinational pharmaceutical companies exceeded KRW 100 million. Boehringer Ingelheim Korea and Viatris Korea were found to have average salaries reaching KRW 150 million.

According to an analysis of audit reports from 27 multinational pharmaceutical subsidiaries disclosed by the Financial Supervisory Service, the average employee salary was KRW 114.37 million. Of these, 21 companies paid average annual salaries of KRW 100 million or more, indicating that a high-salary structure has spread across the industry.

This average salary was calculated based only on salary items listed in audit reports, excluding welfare benefits, bonuses, incentives, or retirement benefits. Additionally, there may be some discrepancy between this figure and the actual perceived annual salary due to differences in accounting treatment of labor costs across companies.

Among the companies surveyed, Boehringer Ingelheim Korea recorded the highest average salary. The company paid a total of KRW 24.94 billion in salaries last year, an 8.8% increase year-over-year. The average salary per employee rose from KRW 139.8 million in 2024 to KRW 157.86 million last year, an increase of KRW 18.06 million.

Viatris Korea ranked second with KRW 145.26 million per employee. This represents an increase of approximately KRW 10 million compared to the previous year’s average of KRW 135.87 million. The company’s total payroll for last year was KRW 13.28 billion, a 14.5% increase from 2023.

Gilead Sciences Korea paid an average of KRW 139.94 million per employee, slightly down from KRW 141.32 million in 2024. Total salary payments decreased by 2.4% to KRW 12.97 billion.

Pfizer Korea’s average salary was KRW 127.42 million, about KRW 1 million higher than in 2023.

However, total salary expenses fell 6.3% to KRW 47.78 billion. This increase in the average annual salary per employee is attributed to a decline in the number of employees from 404 in 2024 to 375 last year.

Pfizer has operated a voluntary retirement program since the end of the pandemic. Severance pay, which serves as a form of compensation, surged by 202.0% from KRW 5.33billion in 2024 to KRW 16.11 billion last year, reflecting changes in the labor cost structure.

In addition, Sanofi-Aventis Korea, GSK, Ferring Korea, UCB Korea, Amgen Korea, Janssen Korea, Novo Nordisk, AbbVie Korea, Lundbeck Korea, Abbott Korea, Galderma Korea, AstraZeneca Korea, Handok Teva, and Servier Korea all paid employee salaries exceeding KRW 100 million.

Merck Korea’s total salary rose to KRW 45.38 billion, an 8.2% increase from KRW 41.96 billion in 2024. However, the average annual salary per employee was KRW 80.96 million, a 7.2% decrease from the KRW 87.2 million in the previous year. This decrease in the average per-employee figure was due to the increase in the number of employees from 481 to 579.

For BMS Korea, both total salary and retirement benefit expenses increased. The company’s total salary last year amounted to KRW 24.9 billion, an 8.4% increase from the previous year. During the same period, retirement benefit expenses rose by 169.4%, from KRW 3.3 billion to KRW 8.8 billion.

BMS Korea implemented an ERP program for some employees last year. Consequently, the number of employees reported in the audit report decreased slightly from 209 to 190. The company’s average annual salary for executives and employees was KRW 130.58 million last year, ranking fifth among the surveyed companies.