CPHI Milan: Beyond generics, how Indian pharma is rewriting its global playbook

MILAN: Indian pharmaceutical companies at CPHI Milan, Italy’s flagship pharma and chemicals expo, are looking to expand their businesses beyond traditional generic exports, as they explore collaborations, licensing deals, contract manufacturing, and higher-value products. The shift comes as geopolitical tensions, tariffs, and supply-chain disruptions push drugmakers to diversify markets and build a stronger foothold in global pharmaceutical supply chains.

In today’s turbulent economic environment, the opportunity for Indian drugmakers is no longer limited to manufacturing medicines at lower costs for overseas markets and selling them overseas, companies at the expo told The Economic Times Digital. They said the focus is now shifting towards becoming strategic partners to global drugmakers through R&D, CDMO (contract development and manufacturing), licensing, co-development and access to regulated markets.

B. Partha Saradhi Reddy, Chairman of Hetero Group, said the scale of customer engagement at CPHI reflected the event’s importance to the company's global strategy. “It’s all about meeting our global customers. We have close to 700 meetings in three days,” Reddy said.


Officials from companies such as Cipla, Mankind Pharma, Cadila Pharmaceuticals, and Akums told The ET Digital that they are leveraging the Milan event to pursue partnerships, licensing opportunities, and international business.

At the same time, several Indian companies are moving into oncology, respiratory products, biosimilars, specialty and chronic therapies, while expanding CDMO and product-development capabilities.

The common thread visible at CPHI is a shift in India’s pharma export playbook: from selling more generic products overseas to becoming a more integrated and higher-value part of the global pharmaceutical supply chain.

CPHI becomes a global deal-making platform

For Indian players, the CPHI collaborations are more than just selling finished drugs.

Cipla’s North America business came to Milan to strengthen existing partnerships and explore opportunities across generic medicines, specialty pharmaceuticals, oncology, respiratory products, and biosimilars.

“We come to CPHI to attract new partners,” Cipla North America CEO Mark Falkin said.

The Mumbai-headquartered pharma major has entered an exclusive partnership with China’s Qilu Pharmaceutical to license and commercialise QL2107, a biosimilar to pembrolizumab, in the US. The company is also expanding its US respiratory portfolio, having received approval from the USFDA for the generic Advair Diskus and the first AB-rated generic of Ventolin HFA.

According to Falkin, the company is positioning itself for another phase of global growth. “Cipla is a 90-year entity, and we are positioning ourselves for the next 90 years, serving customers globally,” he said.

At the expo, Mankind Pharma is pursuing both inbound and outbound opportunities. Prakash Aggarwal, President of strategy at Mankind Pharma and associated with Bharat Serums & Vaccines, said CPHI is being used to explore global products for in-licensing as well as opportunities to take Mankind’s R&D assets to international partners.

“It’s a platform where we meet partners for in-licensing of products which are developed globally, as well as for out-licensing opportunities from our own R&D pipeline,” Aggarwal said.

Delhi-based Akums Drugs & Pharmaceuticals is not behind; at the expo it is taking a broader approach, exploring contract manufacturing, product development, licensing, co-development, technology partnerships, distribution, and market-entry collaborations.

“We are actively exploring new opportunities to build strategic partnerships across geographies and business models,” Shivangi Jain, Executive Director of Akums Drugs & Pharmaceuticals, said. The company is targeting both developed and emerging markets and wants to use its manufacturing, R&D and product capabilities to strengthen its regulated-market presence.

Moving beyond traditional generics

For Indian pharma, international expansion is increasingly about partnerships and market access, not exports alone. The shift is also visible in what Indian companies are trying to sell.

Officials from Cadila Pharmaceuticals said the company is putting greater emphasis on CMO and CDMO opportunities. Surendra Narayan Singh, Vice President of Cadila's CDMO business, said global customers were looking for partners that could combine manufacturing capability with quality and delivery reliability.

“Global partners are looking for reliable quality, reliable delivery, and a company that understands their requirements even before they articulate them,” Singh said.

The pharma major is investing in dedicated facilities for injectables and oral solid dosage products and in new technologies for global markets.

The company has also seen strong interest at CPHI and is looking to convert that pipeline into business. “The expression of interest has been tremendous. There is a lot of traction, and we hope to convert this into sizeable business,” Singh said.

Global drugmakers increasingly want partners that can support development, technology transfer, regulatory requirements, and production at scale.

That raises the bar for Indian suppliers. Cost remains important, but quality, intellectual-property protection, regulatory compliance and supply security are becoming equally critical. Surat based Anupam Rasayan is pursuing a similar move up the value chain, from intermediates towards advanced intermediates and APIs in selected areas.

The company is also targeting products where technical capability and supply security matter more than commodity-scale pricing.

“We don’t want to compete with China in the commodity market,” Gopal Agrawal, CEO of Anupam Rasayan, said, adding that the strategy is to focus on specialised and higher-value products where Anupam can compete on chemistry capabilities, quality, supply security, and customer relationships rather than price alone.

Geopolitics forcing companies to diversify

Notably, the Indian pharma companies’ expansion is taking place against a more uncertain global backdrop.

Tariffs, geopolitical tensions and shipping disruptions are forcing pharma companies to rethink market concentration and supply chains.

Hetero operates in 120 countries, giving it a broad geographical footprint. But Reddy said geopolitical shocks can still affect individual markets.

Recent turbulence in the Middle East, he said, had affected business in the region, although other markets remained relatively stable.

Geopolitical turbulence is something which we have to live with,” Reddy said, stressing that companies now need to factor geopolitical risks into business planning and costs.

He added that tariffs were not Hetero’s biggest concern, but higher US tariffs could eventually increase the burden on patients and hurt global price competitiveness. He also lauded India's push to conclude more free-trade agreements, saying greater clarity could help companies plan international business.

Other companies are also responding by deliberately spreading their market exposure across geographies.

Cadila’s Singh mentioned that no single market contributes more than 20% of Cadila’s revenue, reducing dependence on the US or any other individual geography.

Mankind is taking a different route by shifting its portfolio towards higher-margin chronic, specialty, and R&D-backed products. “The focus is on increasing the portfolio towards chronic and specialty assets, as well as R&D-backed assets,” Aggarwal said.

The strategy is designed to give companies more room to absorb pricing and trade pressures while reducing dependence on any single market or product category.

Europe+1 creates another opening for India

As a result of supply chain pressures, rising energy and operating costs are making some manufacturing in Europe less competitive, creating room for suppliers outside the region.

Anupam Rasayan’s Agrawal described this as “Europe plus one”—European companies continuing to serve their markets while looking outside the region for cost-efficient and reliable manufacturing. “Europe plus one is definitely a strategy which we are looking at,” Agrawal said.

He added that some products were being discontinued in Europe because production had become uneconomical, while incremental demand could increasingly be served from countries such as India.

According to him, the yet-to-be-tapped opportunity for Indian pharma and speciality chemical firms is not necessarily about replacing China. In his view, Indian companies can target products where customers want an additional manufacturing base because of cost, supply-chain or geopolitical considerations, he added.

For suppliers, however, cost alone will not be enough, Agrawal added. With this focus, Anupam has built warehouses in Europe, the US, and Japan to strengthen supply reliability and is looking to move further up the value chain.

“For China+1 to actualise, the global buyer needs to trust you for supply security, IP protection, quality and logistics resilience,” Agrawal said.

The reporter attended CPHI Milan at the invitation of Anupam Rasayan.