Gland Pharma, which operates primarily under a business-to-business model, is looking at the complex injectables segment, contract development, and manufacturing of biosimilars to fuel its near term growth.

The Hyderabad-based drug firm noted that it has made good progress in the R&D field for planned submission batches for complex injectables to be filed in the current financial year.

Acquisition opportunities

“Our near-term focus remains on establishing a strong portfolio of complex injectables. While we do have an internal program, we are looking at acquisition opportunities to help expedite the development process. Installation of new lines catering to suspensions and hormonal products has been completed,” Srinivas Sadu, MD and CEO, Gland Pharma, said in a recent analyst call.

The company is on track to make four complex injectable filings in this financial year, he added.

Varying complexity

When asked to elaborate on the company’s strategy for the vertical, he said, “If you look at the total basket, the complexity varies from product to product. Some products, the APIs are difficult, some are formulations, and some are like dosage form itself, and some might need a clinical. So it is a combination of everything.”

“What we are filing now is complex in APIs and characterisation, and there are products in suspension mode where we also need biostudy. So, it is not like one product, one complexity for all the products, but it is a mix of everything,” he added.

Vaccine collaboration

Commenting on the biosimilar opportunity, Sadu said, “Biosimilar CDMO (contract development and manufacturing organisation) is the next long-term growth driver we are working towards. While the experience in vaccine collaboration has helped us gain the know-how and accelerated creating facility and technical team, we are also looking at opportunities to collaborate on the biosimilar front to build a pathway to cement our position in the future.”

He noted that the company has already created a 60 KL capacity in the segment.

Fosun framework

“We had actually created the capacity for the vaccine (Covid-19), and then it is expanded to the CDMO for the biosimilar space. We are talking to companies within the Fosun framework and trying to start up with them to initially launch some of their substances from the Indian site,” Sadu said.

Parallelly, the company would also get in touch with other players as interest comes in from companies that want to create a biosimilar portfolio, he added.

The company posted a profit after tax of ₹302 crore in Q2FY22, a year-on-year growth of 38 per cent. Its revenue from operations rose to ₹1,080 crore.

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