August 26, 2019
china

The Changing Face of Regulations and Market Access in China

China is rapidly emerging as world’s fastest growing pharmaceutical industry. The market  is poised to reach $175B by 20221. Faster regulatory approvals and widening market access are some of the major drivers to this growth. China’s rapidly-moving health care industry and unique market characteristics has often required a pharmaceutical company […]
July 24, 2019
VBC

Value-Based Contracts in Pharma – A buzz or a game changer?

The healthcare industry has been talking about adopting a ‘value-based care’ for some time now.1 Overall, the healthcare systems globally are going through a ‘volume-to-value’ shift with the key aim to improve patient outcomes, cost-effectively. Value-Based Contracting (VBC) and Real-World Evidence (RWE) are the underlying tools to achieve value-based care. […]
July 23, 2019
RNA

Biology’s Central Dogma Has Been Overturned! So What?

In August 2018, patisiran, a first-in-class therapy was approved in the US and EU to treat the polyneuropathy associated with a genetic disease 002D hereditary transthyretin-mediated amyloidosis. The therapy uses small pieces of ribonucleic acid (RNA) to effectively ‘silence’ a faulty gene, without changing the deoxy ribonucleic acid (DNA) of […]
July 18, 2019
marijuna

From ‘Weed rush’ to a ‘Pot of Gold’ – Medical Marijuana and the Pharma Industry

    The story back then… Cannabis’ (Marijuana) use as medicine dates back to 4000 BC in China. During the 19th century and till early 20th century, marijuana was used globally, to treat various illnesses such as migraine, neuropathic pain, musculoskeletal pain and in childbirth.2 In Canada, cannabis was added […]
July 12, 2019
Brexit

Deal or No Deal Brexit? – What’s Next for the Pharmaceutical Industry

It’s been almost 3 years since the British voted 52-48% to leave the EU on 23rd June 2016.12  Given the lack of clarity and ensuing uncertainty, the pharmaceutical companies have been planning for a worst-case scenario i.e. no-deal. We will look at the most important (subjectively assessed) implications of a […]
July 10, 2019
3D Printing

Body Printing or Printing Your Body: A Short Introduction To Bioprinting

Biofabrication can be defined as the production of complex living and non-living biological products from raw materials such as living cells, molecules, extracellular matrices, and biomaterials. – Mironov et al., 2015. First things first…What´s 3D printing? The standard two-dimensional (2D) printing is the act of depositing ink on a 2D […]