"We are still seeing very challenging environmental condition in India especially around regulatory aspects of the pharma-biotech sector. We hope that the government will really address this with the sense of urgency," Kiran Mazumdar Shaw, CMD, Biocon said in a earnings press conference.
She alleged that due to confusion in pricing policies stockists have been reluctant to take stock on hand until the pricing issues are resolved. She added that although clinical trials are resuming now, India needed a regulatory robustness. "We don't want more layers being put in to approvals but have expertise and the knowledge with which to approve clinical trials expeditiously," she stressed.
The company reported 18.65 percent rise in consolidated net profit at Rs 93.50 for the first quarter on account of strong performance in the biopharma segment. Consolidated revenue rose to Rs 723 crore from Rs 594 crore in a year ago quarter.
Mazumdar said that Q1 result reflect the company's inherent strength in product portfolio. She expects insulin to be the strong growth driver in current fiscal. The company will launch its second novel biologic drug Alzumab used in psoriasis treatment in August. "We are now of course looking at taking this molecule global and we are in discussion with several companies that are very keen to partner this program in our global development plan," she said.
Below is the verbatim transcript of the interview
Q: I heard you mention at your press conference that you are seeing some challenges in the India business because of the pricing pressure etc, what kind of a pressure are you expecting to see going ahead and what could the growth slip to?
A: I do not think I am referring to pricing pressures. I am talking about pricing policy issues because basically the industry itself has had a steady decline in terms of growth. Quarter-on-quarter (Q-o-Q) for the last five quarters largely because there has been uncertainty and lack of clarity around the drug pricing policy. So now that has been sort of fairly addressed hopefully now all the questions are answered and the sector will start correcting because I think as far as Biocon is concerned, we haven't had a major hit out of all these price control issues. So we have had a very nominal kind of impact on all our products.
This has created a lot of market uncertainty in terms of pharmacists and stockists of product and about labeling of pricing on products and whether we need to sort of wait till we get the prices ascertained and things like that. So those kind of issues, an unnecessary issues including things like the knee-jerk reaction to the Pioglitazone issue where the government suddenly banned it and now they are planning to revoke the ban.
This does not augur well for the sector. So these are the kind of issues, which are more external in nature. It is not about competitive pricing pressure. There we are very clear that Biocon has done extremely well because we have such a differentiated portfolio and we have done extremely well and that is where we have seen improved margins as reflected in this quarter's earnings.
Anda sedang membaca artikel tentang
Drug pricing policy issue hurting sector's growth: Biocon
Dengan url
https://rokokkanker.blogspot.com/2013/07/drug-pricing-policy-issue-hurting.html
Anda boleh menyebar luaskannya atau mengcopy paste-nya
Drug pricing policy issue hurting sector's growth: Biocon
namun jangan lupa untuk meletakkan link
Drug pricing policy issue hurting sector's growth: Biocon
sebagai sumbernya
0 komentar:
Posting Komentar