India and drug #patents : The Ghost of #Glivec haunts #Sovaldi

Apothecurry welcomes back guest columnist Dr Kristina Lybecker. Her latest column is an elegantly simple "where the rubber hits the road" exposition of the recent rejection of patents on US biopharma company Gilead's Hepatitis C drug Sovaldi in India. Coincidentally, Gilead's European patent on Sovaldi was challenged yesterday by charity Medicins du Monde marking yet …

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Scoop : Sandoz shutters India formulations R&D

Sandoz, the generics arm of Swiss drug maker Novartis AG, has decided to shutter a second research and development (R&D) centre in India in under 12 months.  This time it is the formulations or finished dosage forms R&D unit located in Kalwe, near Mumbai, that is facing closure affecting 147 employees. Novartis India confirmed the …

Beyond Glivec : Balancing innovation and public health

I'd like to introduce a guest column by Dr Kristina Lybecker, Associate Professor of Economics at Colorado College in Colorado Springs. Kristina is an economist with a PhD from the University of California at Berkeley. She specialises in innovation and intellectual property rights and has been writing on these issues for 12 years. She is …

Straws in the wind? Sandoz to shut API devt centre in India

Sandoz, the world's second-largest generic drugs company and a unit of Swiss drug maker Novartis has decided to shut its active pharmaceutical ingredients or API development facility near Mumbai.  A Novartis spokesperson said in an e-mail to this writer that this was part of "recent project portfolio optimization within Sandoz Global Development." The spokesperson added …