The Ahmedabad-based Dishman Pharmaceuticals and Chemicals Ltd. (DPCL) has signed a eight-year supply contract with Solvay Pharmaceuticals b.v. of Netherlands to produce and supply eprosartan API and its intermediates. This is the first time that a recently patented molecule will be manufactured in India on a contract basis. With this contract, Dishman becomes the second supplier of the product to Solvay.

Eprosartan was patented and launched in the western markets as recently as 1997. It is an active ingredient in Teveten (eprosartan mesylate), an angiotensin-II-receptor antagonist that belongs to the newest class of drugs available for the treatment of hypertension. Solvay acquired the worldwide marketing, manufacturing and development rights for Tevetan from SmithKline Beecham in May 1999.

The supply of eprosartan API to Solvay would add about US $ 10 million (Rs. 46 crore) to the Rs. 100 crore annual turnover of Dishman. The company has built a dedicated cGMP and US FDA compliant manufacturing facility for Solvay at its complex at Bavla near Ahmedabad at a cost of Rs. 50 crore.

"The signing of this contract with Solvay shows the confidence this international pharmaceutical major has in our capabilities," says J. R. Vyas, managing director, DPCL.

Dishman, a contract manufacturing organisation specialising in active pharmaceutical ingredients, intermediates and quaternary compounds, started its research and development work in the late 1980s and began exports of a range of phase transfer catalysts and quaternary compounds in 1990-91. Today it is a global leader in the quaternary business with 80 per cent of its sales coming from exports. Among its international customers are SmithKline Beecham, E Merck, Janssen and Sanofi.

Vyas revealed that his company is also working on contract research projects for Janssen of the US, Fine Chemical Corporation of South Africa, Gold Shield of the UK and Ratio Pharm of Germany besides a project with a Japanese pharmaceutical company for the manufacture of superstatins. The last mentioned project, according to Vyas, would be much larger than the one with Solvay.