Indian pharma growth outpaces rivals

The Cambridge Consultants workshop, attended by a cross–section of senior personnel from a variety of functions within leading Indian and multinational companies, explored the question of whether India would become one of the world’s leading pharmaceutical countries by 2030. Recent reports suggest India’s domestic pharmaceutical sector will grow to $55 billion by 2020. As a significant exporter of high-quality generic drugs, India is expected to see the value of its drug exports double to $25 billion by the end of 2014, according to the country’s Minister of Health.

Delegate feedback revealed the Indian pharmaceutical industry still has significant growth opportunities, and major local companies could have the potential to compete with multinational pharmaceutical companies. Amongst them, the greatest impact in world markets will come from those Indian pharmaceutical companies which adopt technology innovations to differentiate their products and make them more competitive both domestically and globally. This trend for differentiation is particularly important as Indian pharmaceutical companies have fewer new generic opportunities. This is because the number of new chemical entity (NCE) filings to the US Food and Drug Administration has declined over recent years and the number of innovator drug patents reaching their expiry date has peaked. Similarly, at a global level there are more generic pharmaceutical developers from other emerging nations, including China, which will offer low-cost competition for India, as well as the ongoing global threat of counterfeit drugs.

Dr Cyrus Karkaria, president of the biotech division at Lupin Pharma India, said: “The Indian pharmaceutical market is really at a very exciting yet challenging point, where it can become an even greater contributor to the Indian economy. Indian pharma companies must remain competitive and look to innovate and adopt technologies that can complement and accelerate the uptake of drugs for better health management.”

Technology can play a pivotal role in the Indian pharmaceutical industry as success will be driven by combining drugs with devices and delivery systems – rather than by drugs alone. In addition, Indian pharmaceutical companies could benefit from the following technologies:

• Injectable technology – A growing number of Indian companies are moving into biologics (including biosimilars and biobetters) where injectable therapies necessarily predominate due to the greater difficulty of formulating these drugs for oral administration. Injection technologies, such as auto-injectors and patch pumps, can provide easier and less painful drug administration.
• Inhalation products – Inhaled products are already commonplace in the Indian market through major local and multinational products, targeting respiratory disease markets such as asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. Indian companies with this pre-existing specialist knowledge are well placed to develop value-added products using the pulmonary route to deliver systemic drugs.
• Medical devices – Indian pharmaceutical companies are unlikely to build significant expertise purely in this area. Instead, they could use experienced device design and development consultants to support their significant formulation/chemistry expertise. Indian companies have the opportunity to change manufacturing and production methods to support the further adoption of drug delivery device technologies.
• Connected health – Against the background of rising healthcare costs, Indian pharma companies can use technology to harvest and beneficially use data to bring benefits to healthcare providers and consumers alike. Given India’s dominance in IT and software in places like Bangalore, it isn’t beyond belief that a connection could be made between one industry and the other, placing India in a strong position to become a global player in connected health markets.

With worldwide engineering teams based in Cambridge, UK, and Boston in the USA, Cambridge Consultants designs and develops innovative medical devices and technologies for the world’s leading companies and for innovative start-ups. The company works with leading pharmaceutical companies to deliver market-leading inhalation and injection devices, clinical diagnostics and life science instrumentation, surgical and interventional devices, wireless medical technology and pharmaceutical business consulting.