Biocon Colloboration with Mylan Pharma

From past two months I was expecting Biocon to tie up for some sort of bio similar collaboration, I thought it was going to form alliance with any one of the top 5 pharmaceuticals in United States as posted by me in my blog on June 14th, 2009. But it went on to form alliance with Mylan Pharmaceuticals (third largest generic pharmaceutical company), now the next companies to watch are Intas Biopharmaceuticals and Nicholas Piramal :)

Big Daddies alliances with Generics.......

Recently a new trend has been observed in pharmaceutical Mergers & Acquisitions. Many big daddies like Pfizer and GSK are strategically forming alliances with generic companies in the emerging markets.

Sanofi aventis is also planning to form alliances with some big generic companies and venture into these niche markets.

I am waiting to hear news about BMS (Bristol Mayer Squibb) M&A activity in Eastern Europe, middle east and some Latin American countries.

DBT (Department of Biotechnology) .......let's praise for this initiative

Bharat Immunological and Biologicals Corporation Limited (BIBCOL) in association with DBT (Department of Biotechnology) of India is developing dispersible zinc tablets. The formulation is for children and infants. These tablets are being made in such a way that they disintegrate rapidly when mixed in a teaspoonful of clean water or expressed breast milk.

Clinical trails have been conducted and it has been clearly shown that Zinc treatment is a highly efficacious treatment in acute diarrhoea and those treated for 10 to 14 days also showed greater resistance to episodes of diarrhoea.

Best feature of the collaboration is that DBT (Department of biotechnology) of India is taking steps to popularize the product among various state health departments and these medicines will be supplied for free in states like Bihar, Chhattisgarh and Assam.

GSK .........filling its pipeline

GSK over the past one year has made several mega deals for Cancer treatment, Yesterday again it signed a new collaboration, in which it will utilize technology from Chroma therapeutics from UK. In this deal GSK will pay chroma $1 billion in fees, milestones and options. The money will be used to advance Chroma's CHR-2797 into a late-stage cancer study and to move further another compound CHR-2845 toward clinical proof-of-concept.

It is notable that with these series of M&A and collaboration, GSK is filling its pipeline for cancer treatment for the coming decades and will thus become one of the prominent player for cancer therapeutics domain.

Mobile clinics & health schemes................Incredible India

Yesterday I was reading an article on Top drug makers in US pledging $80 Billion for providing drugs over to people in US in coming decade, what I was thinking why don’t drug companies and state government collaborate to start Mobile clinics and community health plan. There are some organizations in down south which are catering to the need of rural and urban India as in Karnataka, and there was one company started by budding entrepreneurs in Rajasthan but these people working in rural parts of Rajasthan were not able to continue for more than a year for lack of funds. Why don’t we take an initiative to have these mobile hospitals and health plan or rather community plan for the lower middle class and for those living below the poverty line?

Wockhardt sometime back started mobile clinic in and around Aurangabad district of Maharashtra. Why don’t more companies come out in open and take this initiative and we all should be part of the movement to make India the best place to live.

Because this movement will not only cater to the requirement of medicines for lower income group but at the end of the day will lead to more job opportunities for skilled and non skilled people. Let’s pledge for "Incredible India".

Big Pharma going for generic/biosimilar Acquisitions............................

There are many success stories of generic companies becoming a billion dollar company in a short span of time, over the past 20 years we have seen that many generics companies became public in duration of 7-9 years, it’s a great achievement of these companies.

As the competition is becoming tough day by day between the innovator companies and the generics, I feel that big daddy's such as Pfizer, GSK, J&J, and Merck will soon perhaps in coming quater or year/next decade will strategise their deal towards acquiring medium to average size (200-800M revenue) generic or bio similar companies.

What do you people feel about it, share your thoughts.......

Cipla story.....................

Cipla was founded in year 1935 as The Chemical, Industrial & Pharmaceutical Laboratories. It is a prominent Indian pharmaceutical company, which is market leader in respiratory segment with its brand Asthalin, cardiovascular disease, arthritis, diabetes, weight control, depression and in recent past has diversified into AIDS and HIN1 treatment. In early 1980's it persuaded than congress government to give relaxation in Indian patent law so that home grown generic companies could meet the domestic market demand, this helped many prescription based generic companies to expand internally and in global scenario. Cipla through this reform now has its global presence in more than 180 countries.

Cipla this decade after GATT agreement follow up in Indian pharma scenario in year 2005 has shifted it focus on manufacturing generic version of drugs used for life threatening and pandemic diseases, In this scenario as its making life saving drugs cheaper version in one fourth of their original price it gets support of NGO's all over the world and world health organization, so that the originator companies cant pin point, I am very sure within 1 year it will launch its own generic version for treatment of H1N5.

At present Cipla has revenue worth approximately USD100 Billon and you can perhaps say it’s a highly profitable company with so called humanity touch , I think case studies should be prepared for how this small company went on to become top generic player in India and world with its very unique business model.

Hoover's free day out .......

Sometime around 1 year back I had chance to use One source data base in my previous organization and Hoovers was accessible to some privileged people in investment research, today on this day 17th of June 2009, I got an email from Hoovers saying that I can access their database till 5:30 PST, 17th June 2009..........I came from office at around 3:00 AM (IST), 18th June 2009 and I wanted to explore Hoovers, what I found is that Hoovers is more comprehensive than one source as it has industry wise in-depth segmentation.....I have become an ardent fan of Hoover database............................what about you all, when are you going to explore it :)

Dr Reddy's and GSK alliance...................

As stated by me on 14th June blog about Reddy's alliance with some european pharma giants, the news is Dr Reddy's and GSK signed a deal which gives GSK exclusive access to Dr. Reddy's portfolio and pipeline of more than 100 branded pharmaceuticals in segments including cardiovascular, diabetes, oncology, gastroenterology and pain management, wherein these products will be manufactured by Dr. Reddy's and licensed and supplied by Glaxo in countries in Africa, Middle East, Asia Pacific and Latin America. In certain markets, products will be co-marketed by GlaxoSmithKline and Dr. Reddy's.

After Pfizer in US it is Glaxo in Europe which is aggresively closing deals.......................

After Ranbaxy Labs its Wockhradt in news ....

After Ranbaxy Labs sales in 2008, there is one more big M & A for year 2009, i.e. sale of Wockhardt biotechnology and veterinary division, According to some reports US drug major Pfizer is reportedly in an advanced stage of talks with Wockhardt to acquire its biotechnology and veterinary divisions, the deal, which could value Wockhardt's comparatively smaller businesses is of worth around Rs 1.2bn.

Indian Pharma Inc.......................

Yesterday I was reading about big pharmaceuticals eying for Indian generic players.....I know that at this time Indian generic or prescription drug market is vulnerable, there was news in march that GSK was first eying on Nicholas Piramal and then it went on closing deal with Shanta Biotech.....and later Wockhardt hospitals being acquired by Apollo group.......there are many ventures to come such as Reddy's alliance with European pharma giants, Biocon licensing with top 5 American pharma giants.....we have more to see, its just the beginning for India Inc..........I feel that Indian companies should wait for some more time and go for higher value deal than Ranbaxy labs , 10 time more than Ranbaxy-Diiachi deal.........................................What do you people say?

Two sides of coin.......MERCK Inc.

Merck at one side has made a $185 Million deal with Xenon pharmaceutical Inc to discover, develop novel small molecule candidates for the potential treatment of cardiovascular disease and on the other side on the very same day it announced that it is going to shed around 16,000 jobs as it is combining its operations with its rival Schering-Plough.......Merck was once considered one of the best pharmaceutical companies to work with and there were many white papers written on this company history.........its was considered as company with humanity touch :)........what will you say about it now?

Sol Pharma- Twist and Turns

Sol Pharmaceuticals..................................did we anytime heard this name , the answer will be no.....this company came into existence in year 1979 in Hyderabad... after this in mid 80's Sol pharmaceuticals and Dr Reddy's formed alliance..........later after some years there were some differences created between the two, Sol pharmaceutical separated itself from the alliance taking some bright mind's from Reddy's. later Reddy's went on to become a billion dollar company ..........and Sol pharmaceutical later in year 2002 was declared a weak pharmaceutical company......................though Sol pharma took the best mind of other Reddy's, it was not able to sustain and survive......what are all the factor's do you think would have led to the downfall of Sol Pharmaceutical?

Pfizer......Cancer drug for Pets........

Pfizer yesterday got approval for Palladia to treat advanced mast cell tumours in dogs, the first of its kind for treating cancer in canines. Researchers at Pfizer recruited around 150 dogs for the pivotal pet study, and observed that Palladia caused reduction or disappearance of tumours in 43 percent of cases. Less than one in ten dogs in the placebo arm had a similar response in the said pivotal trial. I think that it is high time for Indian biopharmaceuticals as they can strategise and focus on venturing into these specialized segment, thus diversifying their services to the society.

GSK ------interested in venturing with startups

GSK India is one of the best payers in Indian Pharmaceutical sector......and news is that GSK global is venturing into collaboration with start-ups and funding companies with new ideas........great going ...........I don’t think recession had any severe implication in pharma segment........as now bigger sharks are venturing as angel investors.

GSK Deal.......................this week.....

Last month GSK alliance with Pfizer for collaboration for HIV drugs was part of the news stand and this week again GSK made headlines by announcing its collaboration with Concert Pharmaceutical. In this deal Concert will be receiving around $35 million in upfront payments, including a $16.7 million equity investment and GSK will get CTP-518, a protease inhibitor for the treatment of HIV which is expected to enter Phase I clinical trials in the second half of 2009, a preclinical compound for chronic renal disease, and a third research product in Concert's pipeline..........
I think its time for Gilead and BMS to develop and add more Drugs in their existing drug discovery pipeline, so that in the coming decades these companies will be able to sustain their position in HIV domain.

BMS in news after long time

After BMS deal with Indian biopharmaceutical last year for co-development of drug molecules, BMS is now eying on stakes in Ireland based Élan pharmaceutical as the later is seeking for finances for drug for treating Alzheimer’s. BMS is looking for strategic deals for some months as its allies have been involved in many deals in 1st and 2nd quarter of this year.

Good going BMS................................................

Cancer Mega deals last and this Quarter...........

Past Quarter and this quarter there have been huge number of alliances and mega deals in oncology segment, in rough terms the total comes to around 3 to 4 Billion. What I have observed that the top 10 mega pharma companies are becoming the major players by acquiring or funding smaller companies from drug development to clinical trials in oncology segment.

There are quite many challenges in oncology trials which I will capture later in some other article, so now a days bigger pharma companies are collaborating to incur the cost equally, for example Merck and Astrazeneca as per today's 1st June news headlines are collaborating for Merck's MK-2206 and AstraZeneca's AZD6244, both of which are still in very early development.