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Our Bureau

Bangalore March 8 Biocon on Thursday released five renal therapy drugs which are priced 35 per cent - 40 per cent lesser than those available in the market.

The Biocon Managing Director, Dr Kiran Mazumdar, told newspersons that the new immunosuppressant drugs for renal therapy include Renodapt, Tacrograf, Cyclophil ME, Rapacan and Erypro. Immunosuppressants are medicines that inhibit or prevent the activity of the body's immune system. The company undertook research as well conducted countrywide multi-centric trials for over four years before launching the drugs, an official with the company said.

Ms Mazumdar said the company expects to garner 25 per cent of the Rs 300-crore market for renal therapy products in the country. The immunosuppresant drug market itself is worth around Rs 125 crore. The global market for renal therapy drugs is worth around $3.3 billion.

Ms Mazumdar said renal related diseases affect over 1 lakh patients every year in the country. "Of this, only 20 per cent of these patients are able to afford renal replacement therapy," she pointed out. She said the company expects to export the drugs to the Gulf Cooperation Council markets and other neighbouring countries between six months and nine months, she said.

Ms Mazumdar said its newly carved out nephrology division expects to release more drugs in the market which include certain aspects of kidney related diseases. "To achieve this end we will continue to increase investments in the R&D division," she said. Biocon expects to double its R&D spend in 2007-08 as well, she said.

She said with its strong focus on R&D, Biocon offers services in custom research in the fields of synthetic chemistry and molecular biology in early stage drug discovery and development. Clinical research is carried out in the fields of clinical studies and clinical trials.

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