Gujarat based Intas Biopharmaceutical Ltd will be going for more product registrations in the CIS market soon. The company already has a market presence in the CIS countries as a whole and specially in Belarus, Ukraine, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan.

CIS is a semi-regulated market bifurcated into 12 countries namely, Russia, Ukraine, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan.

Speaking with Pharmabiz R Chandrashekhar, Sr. vice president global marketing and business development, IBPL, said, "Our current product portfolio include three bio-generic products - Neukine (rHu G-CSF), Erykine and Epofit (rHu EPO) and Intalfa (rHu IFN Alfa-2b) and we have plans to launch 5 to 6 new biotech products in the CIS market. IBPL business model for CIS market is distribution based and has every scope of expanding in the region".

Unlike India, the CIS markets have very limited price control. Moreover, entering the CIS market itself is becoming more expensive. Every drug has to be registered with the health ministry at a cost of $25,000 and has to be re-registered every five years. Then there is an additional charge for every different mode of drug delivery. Medium-sized companies could look for sales and marketing alliances in Russia, provided their product portfolio is suitable. Newer drugs and stronger distribution are the need of the hour.

The registration norms are stringent in the Russian market, which gives opportunities to very few selected biotech companies to enter the region. Language constraints could be a dampener though not a major hindrance factor. However, since the economy is booming, there exist newer opportunities in the Russian market especially for Indian Pharma especialy biotech companies to launch new products and strengthen sales and distribution network in the region.

While asking about company's entry into the new market in the CIS region, Chandrashekhar said, "We are willing to enter into the new market at CIS region in the near future. As IBPL already have distribution agreements in place covering quite a few CIS countries and the process of product registration is in advanced stages".