Dr Rajiv Modi, Chairman CII Pharma Summit 2013 and CII Gujarat State Council and and Chairman and Managing Director, Cadila Pharmaceuticals said, “India has an efficient pharma industry, which has been making affordable drugs not just for the Indian markets but has also been exporting them to the world. The sector is currently experiencing slow growth. Henceforth, both the Indian and foreign companies operating in India will have to devise suitable strategies in order to be in the top 10 global markets by 2020.”
Ninad Karpe, Chairman, CII Maharashtra State Council, pointed out that even though India is the third largest market by volume and fourth largest by value, “growth has been good, but only in a particular zone.”
“India is a blessed market with genetically varied people, which makes it good for clinical trials, but due to public interest litigations (PILs) in court, clinical trials have come down,” said HG Khosia, Commissioner, Food and Drug Administration, Government of Gujarat. He said that when a PIL was filed, the sector should counter it by giving the correct picture. “We are not against anyone, but we need new drugs to protect human lives,” he added.
JP Parswani, Executive Director, Cadila Pharmaceuticals, said the slowdown provides the sector with an opportunity. “Big data, cloud computing, and networking are changing the way business is being done in India,” he said, and urged the sector to adapt to the changes.
“The challenge for the pharma sector today is to graduate to the next level, and to get into new areas,” said Dr KV Subramaniam, President and Chief Executive Officer, Reliance Life.
Hasit Joshipura, Senior Vice-President – South Asia, and Managing Director, India, GlaxoSmithKline Pharmaceuticals, said that the new norms will affect growth, but added that with state governments increasing their spending on healthcare, new opportunities were being opened up for the pharma sector. “India remains an underpenetrated market,” he added.
EP News Bureau – Mumbai