Ranbaxy to launch country's first 'made in India' drug

NEW DELHI: Ranbaxy Laboratories, India’s largest drug maker, is launching the country’s first indigenously developed new medicine, a malaria drug, later today that promises to boost the new drug development abilities of the Indian pharma industry.

The antimalaria drug, a combination of two molecules -- arterolane maleate and piperaquine phosphatethe -- is expected to be priced at a significant discount, as low as one third, to some alternatives.

In addition, Ranbaxy’s drug used to treat P Falciparum malaria needs to be taken once a day by patients for three days unlike most other comparable treatments in which patients have to take eight pills for three days.

The raw material for the drug is synthetically made which will allow the company to address supply concerns. At present, malaria drugs are based on artemisinin, which is derived from plants. India has to depend on imports of the raw material and there are volatilities in prices and supply.

The company’s share price is trading at Rs 517.30, down 1.36%, at 2 pm on a weak Mumbai market.

The launch of this drug will end a 15-year drug discovery drought for Indian medicine makers. These companies have mastered the art of developing generic versions of original drugs, but success has eluded them in their new drug development efforts which began in earnest in the mid to late 1990s.

Several locally developed molecules have made it to the clinical trial stage, but so far none of them has had a commercial launch.