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The View from Hyderabad: The “Indian” Pharmaceutical Industry and the New Patent Regime

Murphy Halliburton

in India and the Patent Wars: Pharmaceuticals in the New Intellectual Property Regime

The boom town of Hyderabad is the center of India’s pharmaceutical industry, and this was where I met with representatives from two Indian pharmaceutical companies to discuss topics such as economies ... More

The boom town of Hyderabad is the center of India’s pharmaceutical industry, and this was where I met with representatives from two Indian pharmaceutical companies to discuss topics such as economies of scale in pharmaceutical production—the special capacity of the Indian pharma sector—licenses with foreign multinationals such as Gilead and prospects for new research and development. This chapter argues that those who anticipate a simple takeover by “multinational” companies of “Indian” companies, which are in fact also multinational, simplify what are complex and surprising emergences negotiated by quite powerful India-based corporate actors. The chapter also examines the first two patented drugs developed in India under the new patent regime, an anti-malarial medication and a cancer drug, and considers whether new research by Indian companies will focus on medical problems affecting low income countries or on products for high income markets.Less

Introduction

in Market Menagerie: Health and Development in Late Industrial States

This introductory chapter discusses the theme of this volume which is about health technologies and the health market in late industrial countries. This volume is divided into three sections. The ... More

This introductory chapter discusses the theme of this volume which is about health technologies and the health market in late industrial countries. This volume is divided into three sections. The first section lays out the core arguments on development and regulation beyond market-failure arguments, the second provides the empirical core of the three markets and their submarket environments of Indian pharmaceuticals during the period from 1950 to 2000, and the final section analyzes health technologies from a global perspective. This volume also considers issues concerning the development of industrial capabilities in late industrializers, the politics of their access, and their geography of production and redistribution.Less

Have China and India Become More Innovative Since the Onset of Reforms in the Two Countries?

Amiya Kumar Bagchi and Anthony P. D’Costa

in Transformation and Development: The Political Economy of Transition in India and China

This chapter compares innovative activities in India and China. It first presents the larger context against which one may analyze the nature and extent of innovative activities in these two ... More

This chapter compares innovative activities in India and China. It first presents the larger context against which one may analyze the nature and extent of innovative activities in these two countries. It then presents quantitative evidence on whether the two economies are becoming innovative. The Chinese National System of Innovation (NSI) is dominated by the Sectoral System of innovation (SSI) of the electronics and telecommunications industries; for India it is dominated by the SSI of the pharmaceutical industry. In both countries, innovative activities are increasingly provided by multinational corporations. In other words, both China and India have become important locations for innovative activities. However, the continued rise in innovative activity in the two countries is limited by the availability of finance and high-quality scientists and engineers.Less

Hope in Flow

Anne Pollock

in Synthesizing Hope: Matter, Knowledge, and Place in South African Drug Discovery

This chapter explores a new direction that iThemba Pharmaceuticals had hoped to follow in order to fund its drug discovery work: building “green” pharmaceutical manufacturing capacity in South ... More

This chapter explores a new direction that iThemba Pharmaceuticals had hoped to follow in order to fund its drug discovery work: building “green” pharmaceutical manufacturing capacity in South Africa. This would involve implementing a process known as continuous flow chemistry, with the assistance of an iThemba scientific advisory board member who was a global leader in this area. The chapter argues that flow chemistry provides an opportunity to reflect on temporality and materiality, both on the microlevel of the chemical reactions that are carried out to synthesize molecules and on the macrolevel of providing a route for South Africa to become a site of pharmaceutical innovation. In South Africa, copying India’s model of building a pharmaceutical industry through large-scale manufacture of generic drugs was not feasible, and flow chemistry offered a way to see the lack of current highly polluting infrastructures as a competitive advantage for building green infrastructures of the future. In a manner analogous to cell phones leapfrogging landlines in Africa, the lack of pharmaceutical manufacturing capacity becomes a condition of possibility for skipping to the next paradigm in drug manufacture. The flow chemistry endeavor can be understood as an instantiation of hope for a post-apartheid post-modern.Less