The anti-smoking therapy segment, which witnessed a lot of hype over an year back, is in a bad shape. An industry source said the segment is not yielding sizeable returns. The total bupropion hydrochloride market is worth Rs 2.9 crore, and has recorded a growth of 135 per cent.

According to annual retail audit figures of October 2002, the brand leader Zyban, the original bupropion hydrochloride compound of GlaxoSmithKline Pharmaceuticals Ltd which hit the Indian shelves in May 2001, has recorded a sales of just Rs 59.37 lakh and a market share of 20.42 per cent. The annual growth of Zyban is 34.8 per cent.

Smoquit and Bupron, two bupropion hydrochloride brands of Sun Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd, have grossed a sale of Rs 1.27 crore with a market share of 43.7 per cent. The growth is reported to be 388.4 per cent.

Nicotex, the Cipla brand of bupropion hydrochloride, has sales of Rs 24.42 lakh.

Zyban has been a very tricky product to sell, a Glaxo source says. It is not a typical pharma product when it comes to selling. In the absence of direct media advertising for consumers, one has to identify motivated smokers and then direct them to medical practitioners.

Sun Pharmaceuticals Industries Ltd's first product Bupron (bupropion hydrochloride) was brought to the market in July 2001 end by the Synergy division of the company and the second product, Smoquit (bupropion SR 150mg tabs) came through its Solaris division in August the same year.

Sun Pharma's anti-smoking drug costs Rs 1350 while Glaxo's Zyban costs Rs 5000 for a course of the medication. The Glaxo source argued that price was never a barrier to sales.

Bupropion blocks nicotinic receptors so as to prevent the reuptake of neurotransmitters norepinephrine and dopamine. This mechanism of action sidesteps the problem of the urge to smoke and withdrawal symptoms.

The Royal College of Physicians says nicotine is highly addictive - similar to addiction to hard drugs such as heroin or cocaine. This is important because it shows why it's so hard to give up smoking. Only about 2-3 per cent of smokers succeed in giving up in any year. About 50 per cent of young adult smokers will still be smoking when they are 60.

According to the industry source, all the players are unhappy with the segment. The anti-smoking segment brands may well end up as tail-end social brands with very little promotion budgets, and remain in the brand portfolio just to lend support to a social cause, the source says.