BOSTON – Nov. 14, 2013 – The pharmaceutical industry, especially Big Pharma, has dramatically shifted its R&D focus from its historical concentration on small molecule drugs to include a rapidly increasing number of biotechnology products, according to a newly completed analysis from the Tufts Center for the Study of Drug Development.
Tufts CSDD found that biotech products, which accounted for only 7% of revenue generated by the 10 top selling pharmaceutical-biotech products worldwide in 2001, accounted for 71% of the 10 top selling products in 2012.
The transformation of Big Pharma has been driven as much by new technologies that have enabled development of new products that improve disease outcomes and command high prices, as by the expiring patents on many top-selling small molecule drugs, according to Tufts CSDD Director Kenneth I Kaitin.
Helping to drive that evolution has been the development of novel technology platforms over the last three decades, which has spurred an extensive pipeline of products across a wide range of therapeutic areas, he said. In 1989, for example, only 13 biotechnology products were commercially available. By 2012, that number had grown to 210.
"The notion that large pharmaceutical companies primarily develop small molecule drugs no longer holds," Kaitin said.
The analysis, reported in the November/December Tufts CSDD Impact Report, released today, also found that:
*The number of biotech products in clinical trials grew 155% in 11 years, from 355 in 2001 to 907 in 2012, with Big Pharma in 2012 engaged in about 40% of all biotech products in clinical development.
*Financing of biotech research increased nearly 10-fold in a decade, from $10.5 billion in 2001 to $103 billion in 2012.
*Worldwide growth in biotechnology product sales grew 353% between 2001 and 2012, from $36 billion to $163 billion.
The study, which examined R&D, pipeline, and sales data for three specific time points—2002, 2007, and 2012— was conducted by Ronald Evens, adjunct faculty and biotechnology consultant with Tufts CSDD.
ABOUT THE TUFTS CENTER FOR THE STUDY OF DRUG DEVELOPMENT
The Tufts Center for the Study of Drug Development at Tufts University provides strategic information to help drug developers, regulators, and policy makers improve the quality and efficiency of pharmaceutical development, review, and utilization. Tufts CSDD, based in Boston, conducts a wide range of in-depth analyses on pharmaceutical issues and hosts symposia, workshops, and public forums, and publishes Tufts CSDD Impact Reports, a bi-monthly newsletter providing analysis and insight into critical drug development issues.
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