- The Asia-Pacific generics market had a market value of $148.9 billion in 2021
- Teva, Novartis, Viatris, and Sun Pharma were the leading players in the Asia-Pacific generics market
- The generics market in India and China is predicted to grow slowly owing to market saturation
Competitive Landscape Overview
The Asia-Pacific generics market remains dominated by international players such as Teva and Viatris. However, India has a number of domestic leading players in the market, along with Japan. As the Chinese and Indian markets near saturation, growth for the region is predicted to slow. However, other countries in the region are seeing a shift towards generics, which is boosting the market and providing opportunities for players operating in the region. Potential strength for a leading player is the number of generic drugs it has in its pipeline, as the release of new drugs is crucial to boosting sales.
Leading Players
- Teva, based in Jerusalem, offers generic medicines in a range of dosage forms, including capsules, tablets, injectables, liquids, inhalants, creams, and ointments. Teva also provides over-the-counter (OTC) products and active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs).
- Novartis is a healthcare company that focuses on the discovery, development, manufacture, and marketing of prescription and generic pharmaceutical products and eye care products. It provides drugs for the treatment of cancer, cardiovascular diseases, and dermatological conditions, among others.
- Viatris (previously Mylan) is a provider of pharmaceutical products. The company is involved in developing and marketing branded, generic, active pharmaceutical ingredients (API), and over-the-counter (OTC) products in a variety of dosage forms and therapeutic categories.
- Sun Pharma is an Indian specialty pharmaceutical company that offers a wide range of pharmaceutical formulations, such as branded generics and generic pharmaceuticals. The company’s products find application in the treatment of various conditions related to psychiatry.
What are the strengths/weaknesses of the leading players?
- Teva: The company claims to have exceeded all key financial targets, including reducing its cost base by $2.2 billion with a target of $3 billion in cost savings in 2022. Recent performances have been helped by the success of AJOVY. Demand is growing for the only anti-CGRP treatment for the preventive treatment of migraine in adults. In FY2021, Teva spent $997 million on R&D, which is 6% of the revenue. The company has >1,250 generic drugs in its pre-approved pipeline.
- Viatris: Of the $11.5 billion revenues registered by Viatris during 2020, generic drugs made up over half of the revenue in 2020. For the whole company, the generic offerings make up over half of the net sales. The company continues to press for changes to the current structural problems in the healthcare system, which are accused of hindering access to generic and biosimilar drugs.
- Novartis’ subsidiary brand Sandoz is focusing attention on difficult-to-make generic drugs to differentiate the company from the competition. In 2020, the company reported the Sandoz division represented 21% of the group's total sales. Sandoz's growth continued to be driven by sales of biopharma, including biosimilars, which rose 16% to $1.6 billion and sales in Europe rose 9%. Sandoz announced joint investment plans with the Austrian federal govt to strengthen the long-term future of integrated antibiotics manufacturing in Europe.
- Sun Pharma: Generics pricing has put profit in this part under pressure, although signs of price stabilization are emerging. To keep up with rival companies, emphasis is being placed on the development of differentiated generic products. India is the largest supplier of generics. This has helped the company to become the largest generics company in India, and the fourth largest global specialty generic drug company.
How did the COVID-19 pandemic impact leading players?
- Teva’s revenues were higher in the first quarter of 2021 as a result of significant customer stocking due to the COVID19 pandemic. However, following the first quarter, revenues were impacted by lower demand for generic, OTC, and respiratory products, resulting from a decline in doctor and hospital visits by patients, resulting in fewer prescriptions, as well as lower sales of cough and cold products, both due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
- In July 2021, Novartis launched medicines for symptomatic treatment of COVID-19. It addresses the urgent, unmet needs of low and lower-middle-income countries to treat patients with COVID-19 symptoms. The portfolio is being sold at no profit to governments in up to 79 eligible low and lower-middle-income countries during the pandemic.