Lucrative biosimilars space to erode biologics market from 2019

The increasing prevalence of biosimilars will have a noticeably negative impact on the biologics market beyond 2019, despite an initial projected compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 8.3%, taking the overall biologics market value from $162 billion in 2013 to more than $262 billion by 2019.

According to the latest report from research and consulting firm GlobalData, patent expirations of branded biologics and the introduction of clearer regulatory frameworks for biosimilars after 2019 will see the latter capturing the market share from biologics.

Joshua Owide, GlobalData’s director of health care industry dynamics, says: “There are a number of factors driving the initiative towards the global adoption of biosimilars, from austerity measures and slow economic growth in the USA, to an aging population and increasing demand for health care in countries such as Japan. The savings made from choosing biosimilars over biologics are not as substantial as first anticipated, and the cost of biosimilars is expected to be around 20%-30% lower than that of branded biologic therapies. This remains a significant reduction nonetheless, since many biologics command hundreds of thousands of dollars for one year’s treatment.”