New incentives for speeding antibacterial drugs development

The growing threat posed by multi-drug resistant gram-negative organisms (MDR-GNBs) is lending a sense of urgency to the development of antibacterial drugs worldwide. Upcoming regulatory reforms to lower R&D costs and provide incentives for new drug identification will create attractive opportunities for pharmaceutical manufacturers.

A new analysis from Frost & Sullivan, A Product and Pipeline Analysis of the Antibacterial Drugs Market, finds that nearly 80% of drugs currently in the pipeline are from smaller pharmaceutical and biotech companies, of which half do not have any commercialized products in the market.

UK pharma majors GlaxoSmithKline (LSE: GSK) and AstraZeneca (LSE: AZN) and US giant Merck & Co (NYSE: MRK) are the only three established pharmaceutical organizations in the antibacterial drug space.