Contributed by Mr Nilesh Nayak, SCIN Life Science Dept

10 October 2022
India

The pharmaceutical industry is divided into 2 major categories of drug companies – Innovator and Generic.

Innovator Drug Companies (IDC)
IDC are those research-based pharmaceutical companies who invest significantly towards developing New Chemical Entities (NCE) for treatment of diseases. This generally involves heavy investment, to the tune of USD 800 million – USD 1 billion, and has significant risk of failure involved. IDC receive patent protection for their drugs i.e. exclusivity to sell their products for 20 years from the year the product is invented. Since 5-8 years are lost in the research and documentation post the discovery of the drug, they enjoy exclusivity to market their drugs for 12-15 years after approval.

IDC under this segment are the big names in the pharma industry like Pfizer, Novartis, Johnson and Johnson from USA. Japanese pharmaceutical companies are also at forefront in this category with companies like Daichii Sankyo, Takeda, Eisai, launching NCEs. Indian companies are not present in this segment and only few of them like Glenmark, Sun Pharma etc. are working in this area but any blockbuster drug is yet to derive from Indian Pharma companies.

Generic Drug Companies (GDC)
GDC are copycat companies which copy the NCE drugs invented by IDC and try to bring in the same molecules at cheaper costs once the patent protection/exclusivity is over. In the business value chain, GDC fall below the IDC but nevertheless play a very important role in making the drugs available for everyone at cheaper prices without compromising on the quality.

The companies falling in this category are mid-sized pharma companies like Sandoz, Teva, Sun Pharma etc. Japan market has been historically dominated by the IDC but generic drugs are gaining popularity and many GDC like Sawai, Towa, Nissin etc. are growing fast and catching up on the market share. India is the largest supplier of generic drugs to the world and as per Pharmexil (a government body tracking and helping pharma exports), India is manufacturing 40% of the global generic requirements. Hence, India is referred to as the “Pharmacy of the World”, considering our major contributions to the healthcare industry globally.

Role of SCIN Life Science Division
SCIN Life Science Division plays a significant role in facilitating businesses among Indian drug companies, the IDC and the GDC. Considering our strong connections in Japan (through Summit Pharma International, a Sumitomo group company) and our extensive network in India, we are able to negotiate good deals between Indian and Japanese companies. Our business comes from both ways, wherein we sell products/chemicals from Japan to India for conversion into pharmaceutical products, which then being sold back to Japanese companies from India through Summit Pharma International.

Being a value added broker, we help both the Japanese and Indian Pharma companies to collaborate and make drugs cheaper and better for Indian and Japanese markets. Few success stories herewith:

Anti-TB (Tuberculosis) Drug
India has the highest incidence of TB in the world and it affects the poorer sections of the society more. This gave rise to the need of making cheaper and better drugs indigenously. SCIN Life Science has partnered with Japanese raw material suppliers and made available the raw material for the Anti TB drug for almost 3 decades now. This partnership through Summit Pharma International has helped significantly improve the treatment quality and cost for Indian patients.

Anti-Cholesterol Drug
High Cholesterol and stress are the major contributors for heart ailments. Cholesterol lowering drugs are hence, very critical and useful for saving lives of patients with high cholesterol. SCIN supplies the largest selling anti-Cholesterol drug to Japan and has facilitated the entire supply chain process from end to end manufacturing of both the Active Ingredients and Finished Dosage forms from India. Our partner company in Japan enjoys the highest market share for this drug and that’s majorly thanks to the efforts of SCIN and Summit Pharma International in putting together all the stakeholders.

In conclusion, I would like to emphasise that India plays a very important role in the global pharmaceutical industry and SCIN Life Science Division along with our global group company partners like Summit Pharma International and Summit Pharma Europe are helping the Indian companies to achieve in this regard.

Please note that the names of companies and drugs have been not disclosed for business confidentiality purposes