India's Cipla is paying $65 million to buy a significant minority stake in two Asian biotech companies with plans to develop a range of discounted biosimilars. And Cipla's chairman says he specifically wants to create follow-on therapies to three of Roche's top biologics--Avastin, Herceptin and Enbrel--that account for $19 billion in annual revenue.

"Avastin, Enbrel, Herceptin--these are all being marketed today, but the prices are very high," Cipla Chairman Yusuf Hamied, who built the company into a billion-dollar business, tells Bloomberg. "We will have biosimilars for them."

"We will buy a 40 percent stake in Goa-based Mab Pharm and a 25 percent stake in Bio Mabs, Shanghai, through subscription of fresh shares," Hamied told the Economic Times. Cipla gains the rights to sell the biosimilars in India and has also struck a marketing pact with an undisclosed Chinese company.

Cipla is following in the footsteps of other Indian drugmakers like Dr. Reddy's and Biocon, which is partnered with Mylan to develop biosimilars. Cipla's chief says he wants to develop a range of biosimilars for cancer, asthma and rheumatism that can be sold in developing nations around the world.

- read the story from Bloomberg
- here's the report from the Economic Times

Related Articles:
India's Cipla loads up for at-risk launch of generic Nexavar
Hospira gains EMA OK for Neupogen biosimilar
Roche plots a survival course but sees no big biosimilar threat