Pfizer debuts Viagra
in India
  December
20th, 2005
On Tuesday, the little blue pill Viagra was launched in 30 Indian
cities. An estimated 90 million Indian men suffer from erectile
dysfunction. It's originator, pharmacautical giant Pfizer, seeks
to capture 10 to 15 percent of that market within two years, says
the senior director of pharmaceuticals the company’s Indian
division, Pfizer Ltd.
The move by Pfizer may be indicative of the company's confidence
in a real demand for the genuine product since many generic copies
have now been removed from the Indian market. Generic versions of
Viagra, reverse engineered by Indian pharmaceutical companies, have
long been available in India. One version was even available to
Indians before Pfizer’s pill hit the U.S. market in 1998.
Why this market shift?
While it was impossible to patent a drug in India, one could patent
the method of making a drug. Such legal loop holes provided little
protection to developers like Pfizer. Generic products could be
launched legally under Indian Intellectual Law when they were illegal
elsewhere. India's brand of patent law however changed radically
earlier this year. The new patent law now complys with the World
Trade Organization’s TRIPS Agreement under which a product
can be protected for 20 years before others can manufacture and
sell copycat versions.
Therefore, India has agreed to pull from its shelves all copycats
of all drugs approved elsewhere after 1995. Viagra first approved
by the FDA in 1998 is now protected under the new patent law.
‘If a product was [first approved in] 1994, we would still
be able to manufacture and sell it.’ says Charles M. Caprariello
of Ranbaxy Pharmaceuticals, an aggressive patent challenger.
[Source Redherring.com]
Last month, Ranbaxy vowed to battle Pfizer in U.S. courts after
a preliminary injuction in March barred them from marketing its
generic version of Pfizer's blood pressure medication Lipator. Pfizer
filed a patent infringement case in which it seeks $387 million
in lost sales. An Israeli company, Teva Pharmaceuticals, is also
named in the suit.
Free Trade? Fair Trade?
Pfizer will price its Viagra pills at ten times the former generic
rate or 463 rupees ($10.25) for a 50 milligram tablet and 594 rupees
for a 100 mg tablet. AWorld Bank report estimated that the 2003
GNI per capita income for India was a mere $530.00. Irregardless,
Pfizer must believe there are willing and financially able men amoung
India's upper class.
Imported from France, the pills will be distributed by Pfizer's
Indian division.
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