The Hindu Business Line : GSK set to launch cancer drug Tykerb in India

Mumbai, Nov 6 GlaxoSmithKline’s breast-cancer drug Tykerb is set to enter the Indian market by early next year, even as the multinational company lines up a critical care and cardio-vascular drug to be brought into the country through two yet-to-be formalised in-licensing deals.

“We are in the process of signing the deals on the critical care and cardiovascular drugs. And hopefully we should be ready with the announcement by the time the year is out,” said Dr Hasit Joshipura, Vice-President (South-Asia) and Managing Director (India) of GlaxoSmithKline Pharmaceuticals Ltd. One of these drugs will be a patented drug, he said, without giving details.

For GSK, in-licensing is a strategy that is unique to the Indian market and the company already has eight such deals in its kitty. In-licensing accounted for 20 per cent of the company’s growth last year, GSK India’s 10-month-old chief told Business Line.

In the past, GSK has brought in Japanese drug company Eisai’s anti-ulcer drug Parit and Novartis’ anti-fungal drug Terbenafine into India through such deals.

Vaccines in pipeline

Outlining GSK’s plans for oncology product Tykerb, generically referred to as lapatinib, he said, “We have got marketing approval and are waiting for site registration.” The company is confident of launching the drug in the first six months of 2008, he said.

Also in the pipeline for the coming year is GSK’s rotavirus vaccine, related to gastroenteritis. And this too is slated to hit the domestic market in the first half of 2008, he said.

One of the products from the yet-to-be signed in-licensing deals and the company’s six-in-one combination vaccine – Infanrix hexa (that immunises against six diseases) – is also to be rolled-out in this period, he said. The company’s break-through cervical cancer vaccine though is slated to come into India only in 2009.

Given the concerns over pricing cancer drugs, as illustrated by the controversy around Novartis’ blood-cancer drug Glivec, Dr Joshipura said Tykerb is for patients who had failed Herceptin (a medicine from Roche) treatment.

“It very clearly defines the patient group. To that extent pricing would be related to that patient group. It is not a first-line indication. It is for patients who have been unsuccessful on Herceptin. We believe we will be able to structure pricing for that class of patients,” he said.