[Ip-health] Dr Reddy to form a joint venture to make biosimilar generics

[Judit Rius Sanjuan]

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http://www.business-standard.com/india/storypage.php?autono=3D329888
Dr Reddy`s to form JV for off-patent drugs
P B Jayakumar / Mumbai July 29, 2008, 5:18 IST

Dr Reddy=92s Laboratories, the country=92s third-biggest drugmaker, will
form a joint venture with one of the world=92s biggest biotech companies
to make biosimilars or generic versions of patented biotech drugs to
take on Ranbaxy Laboratories, Reliance Life Sciences, among other
Indian companies. Several drugs are expected to come off patent in
this segment in the next five years.

=93The joint venture will be in place during the current fiscal year.
The partner will have the technological expertise and global reach on
developing biosimilars, which is a high reward-high risk business=94 G V
Prasad, vice-chairman and chief executive of Dr Reddy=92s Laboratories
told Business Standard.

Dr Reddy=92s plans to invest over Rs 175-200 crore for the development
and manufacturing of biosimilars in the next one or two years. The
partners would initailly focus on potential areas such as off-patent
biotech cancer drugs and were planning to work initially on about
eight potential products, said Prasad.

=93It is too early to reveal more on the ongoing discussions and
modalities of the proposed joint venture, he added.

Currently, about 10-15 per cent of the global plarmaceutical market
consist of drugs of biotech origin and many of them are expected to go
off-patent in the coming years.

The combined market for biosimilars, also known as follow on
biologicals, is expected to touch $21 billion by 2015 in the US and
Europe. Further, about 30 per cent of the new drug approvals by the
drug regulatory authorities of the US and Europe in the last few years
are of biotech origin, said industry experts.

Already Dr Reddy=92s has set up a biologics development centre in
Hyderabad, with a 250 member scientific team. Dr Reddy=92s has already
developed and launched a few biogenerics, including =91Reditux,=92 a
generic version of Roche=92s Non-Hodgkin=92s Lymphoma drug.

Reditux, which generated a turnover of over Rs.15.4 crore from the
domestic market, is regarded as the world=92s first biosimilar
monoclonal antibody used in the treatment of this kind of cancer.

Further, Dr Reddy=92s is claimed to be the first company in India to
fully develop an in-house biogeneric, =91Grafeel,=92 (generic of biotech
cancer drug Filgrastim), right from the molecular biology phase upto
commercial manufacturing, sources said.

While development of biosimilars such as biogeneric cancer drugs cost
about $ 25-30 million, generics of pharmaceuticals could be developed
within a shorter period of 1-2 years with an investment of about
$10-12 million, said industry experts.

Judit Rius Sanjuan
Attorney
Knowledge Ecology International / Essential Information
www.keionline.org / www.cptech.org
Phone: +1.202.332.2670, x18