Julphar will invest Dh1b in
setting up 11 factories
By Nasouh Nazzal, Staff Reporter
16/11/2006
Ras Al Khaimah: Shaikh Saud Bin Saqr Al Qasimi, Ras Al Khaimah Crown Prince and Deputy Ruler, said on Wednesday that the Gulf Pharmaceutical Industries (Julphar) will increase its capital and expand in the pharmaceutical industry by investing Dh1 billion by setting up 11 new factories, 7 of which will be in the UAE and the four others will be outside the country.
The four outside factories will be based in Sudan, Bangladesh, Afghanistan and Morocco.
He was speaking at the opening of the fourth Arab European Pharma Seminar held at the RAK Hilton, with more than 10 major international pharmaceutical companies participating.
He added that this seminar was one of the best platforms for the pharmaceutical companies from the around the world to exchange ideas and to go forward. Shaikh Saud stressed that the real success was the ability to invest in "ourselves".
Julphar opened a training centre to train its staff on the pharmaceutical industries, and this centre is expected to be regional and include students from the entire region.
Abdul Razzaq
Yousuf, CEO of Julphar said the
requirements of registration
have changed and bio-equivalence
studies became a must for
registration.
Not only the cost of
bioequivalence studies is an
obstacle, but also the
availability of qualified
centres and the guidelines to
follow, specially in products
with narrow therapeutic index
and biosimilars.
Drugs that
have narrow therapeutic index or
classified as 'critical drugs'
require by health authorities
clinical studies to prove their
efficacy and safety, i.e. two
years or more after use in
different markets.
This means that companies have
to bear the cost of clinical
studies - an average of $1
million - and at the same time
lose two years of marketing
those products, rather a huge
cost for companies of the Middle
East, he said.
He added that
as manufacturing of patented
medicine is not allowed by law
and exports to the US and EU are
not possible or at least not
easy, the competition among Arab
companies is becoming more
intense.
He stressed that most of the
multinationals start dumping
prices in private as well as the
tenders by lowering the price of
old generic products as they
introduce new drugs.
He said that suppliers of raw
materials from East Asia are
interested with the US and EU
markets and the supplier to the
Middle East are becoming less
with the prices of the raw
materials increase on yearly
basis.
He said biotechnology products are strictly controlled by few companies in the world and their raw materials are also controlled by few companies.
He stressed that the US and Europe look at the Middle East countries as consuming markets and not as producing markets. He added that a negative perception in US and Europe made exports even more difficult.
Yousef said Pharma industries in the Arab world must invest in biotechnology. It is true that the same is rather costly and time consuming, yet without that, the Middle Eastern companies as generic companies would not survive the next generation.
He said it is important for the Middle Eastern pharmaceutical companies to be able to produce small batches to serve different markets and it is essential to have flexibility in packaging facilities to serve small markets that the multinationals do not look at.
He said in order to survive the impact of patent laws, WTO, and the latest requirements, which impose big financial burdens, the companies must work to export more products.
