A shot in the arm for the Indian Drug discovery/Innovation ecosystem

The recent announcement of collaboration in the field of type 2 diabetes between Boehringer Ingelheim and Connexios LifeSciences, a Bangalore based drug discovery company is good news for the entire Indian ‘innovation’ ecosystem especially in the field of life sciences.

First, to the credit of the investors of Connexios (Nadathur Holdings and Investments), they invested in an idea and held on to it for a decade or so knowing well the pitfalls of such a ‘high risk high gain’ business model and at a time when such type of investments were unheard of in India . In India, unlike the West, we do not see many University spin offs working to bring breakthrough concepts/technology from the ‘bench to the bedside’ so in that aspect Connexios Life Sciences took a bold step to focus on System/Network biology approach to find novel targets and newer ‘first in class’ molecules. Another aspect that is interesting in this is that the company focused all its energies and expertise on type 2 diabetes and metabolic syndrome. Drug discovery is a costly and long drawn affair so focusing on one disease model was a good decision which led to concentrated efforts by the team. This also means that the company has more than one option in terms of novel targets and new small molecules to focus on the disease. So if one program fails, there would be a back up of other targets and small molecule entities (SMEs) giving credibility to the company.

The success of Connexios therefore gives a huge fillip to the ‘research based’ organizations. In India, very few companies focus on impactful research especially in the life science/biotech arena. As India is known as ‘the pharmacy of the world’, hence, most of the pharma companies devote their research activities on the development of generics (formulation, synthesis etc.) with very little emphasis on discovery of newer molecules or targets. This leaves a huge gap in the Indian innovation ecosystem. The news of the collaboration between Connexios and BI should also provide impetus to investors to believe in this type of Business model with more conviction than before. 

There is no denying fact, that India can become a major Innovation hub as it has a huge ‘talent’ pool of high skilled scientists who work at a fraction of cost as compared to the their western counterparts. The time has come to give more credit to our scientists and a better conducive research atmosphere with more investments in this sector so that we have more successful Connexios type stories in the future!

India’s Supreme court ruling on Novartis’s Gleevec – A Perspective

Recently, the Apex court of India rejected the patent application of Novartis’s anti-cancer drug Gleevec (http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/landmark-verdict-gives-big-boost-to-cancer-patients/article4569056.ece?homepage=true)

As per Indian law "ever-greening" of the drugs is not encouraged whereas the big pharma companies keep on doing minor modifications to gain longer patent life in the US and other Western countries. This judgment therefore is in the right direction as it clearly defines what "innovation" is in the Indian drug market context and will give hope to millions of poor patients not only in India but across the world. 

But, I also have a point against the Indian pharma industry which is mostly focused on 'generics'. Indian pharma industry is not too keen on developing new drugs (NCEs) and is looking for major profits once the old drugs come off patent. This is not a healthy trend. Also, the amount being charged by these companies on these drugs can be slashed even more as they have not spent even a penny for the development of these drugs and so there is no point in even charging what they are right now for these drugs!!!

Of course, the above point holds true for NCEs but may not hold true for Biologics!. Biosimilars are a different ball game all together and it would be interesting to see what the future holds for the Indian pharma industry which is betting heavily on generics and biosimilars!

Finally, this verdict is definitely good for the patients and may be also good for the Indian pharma industry in the short run but I feel Indian pharma and Biotech industry need to innovate more and come out of the “profit making with minimal investment mindset"!