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Cipla in pact with Serum Institute to boost vaccines play

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Cipla, India's second largest drugmaker, said its European subsidiary Cipla Europe NV has signed a distribution agreement with Serum Institute of India (SII) for marketing the latter's vaccines in the European market. While both the companies will start with paediatric vaccines distribution, they also plan to later roll out adult vaccines such as for pneumonia, flu and human papillomavirus (HPV) for cervical cancer for women.

Adar Poonawala, CEO and executive director, SII, told dna, "As part of the agreement we will manufacture and develop the paediatric vaccine. But that is just to begin with. Though there is no signed agreement but we have an in-principal agreement to develop adult vaccines such as pneumococcal, HPV and flu vaccines which will come up in the pipeline in the next 3-4 years. So it will take 7-8 years to roll out all these vaccines."

The paediatric vaccines will include segments such as measles-mumps-rubella (MMR), tetanus, hepatitis with a market size for these vaccines expected to be around 300-400 million euros.

Poonawala said that with this exclusive tie-up with Cipla, his company will enter the European region and may later look at extending it to US markets. A global leader in vaccine manufacturing, SII has a presence in 140 countries worldwide except for China, Europe and the US.

The collaboration with SII will also enable Cipla to enter into the vaccines segment.

As per the current agreement, while SII will develop and manufacture paediatric vaccines, Cipla will seek European Medicines Agency approval and market the products in Europe.

Michel Baijot, head of vaccines, Cipla, in a release, said: "This is an alliance of two leaders in their respective fields to focus their efforts on alternate solutions for healthcare authorities in Europe on immunisation programs."

Over the last six months, Cipla has strengthened its presence in Europe having launched respiratory products like Salmeterol / Fluticasone in Germany and Sweden, the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Croatia.

Frank Pieters, head of Europe, Cipla, also said in a release, said: "We are focused on offering a new pharma concept built on layers of value such as newer products, concepts, formats, information and services to help healthcare providers across Europe. We see vaccines as one of the critical components of our offering to European patients. With Cipla's front-end presence and with the support of a dedicated sales force, we will broaden the reach of vaccines across Europe."

Poonawala said that while SII will invest on R&D, quality of products, facility and compliance issues of the plants, Cipla will bear the costs of doing registration and clinical trials in Europe as well as the distribution and marketing costs. He also said that both companies are likely to have equal share of revenue and profit.

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