The growth in the biosimilar opportunity will be driven by several patent expiries of mega-blockbuster biologics in the next 5 years. Between 2012 and 2017, over $60b worth of sales of biologics in the US/EU will lose patent protection. Out of them, Roche’s/Biogen Idec’s Rituxan/MabThera (rituximab), Merck and JNJ’s Remicade (infliximab), and Amgen and Pfizer’s Enbrel (etanercept) had WW sales of ~$23b in 2011 and have patents expiring in EU and ROW in 2013/14. Biosimilar version of Rituxan was launched by Dr Reddy’s Lab. (DRL), Reditux, in India in 2007 and many others are in the pipeline targeting EU, ROW market; Roche is deploying life-cycle management strategies to protect its Rituximab franchise, which despite competition continues to have a healthy growth rate.

In this report, we have analyzed the market opportunity of Rituximab Biosimilar and its competitive landscape. We believe that despite several clinical setbacks in the Rituxan biosimilars’ pipeline, they could pose a challenge to Rituximab by 2018.