CPhI has released findings of part three of the 2016 CPhI Annual Report, which focuses on growth opportunities over the next 5-years—specifically generics consumption and approval process, the use of big data in pharma and the potential of 3D printed formulations. Four experts—Alan Sheppard, Bikash Chatterjee, Emil Ciurczak and Dilip Shah—examine the implications on clinical trial design, generic drug time to market and even the ‘holy grail’ of individualized patient dosage forms.

The overall findings reveal pharma may now be on cusp of new age of high tech applications, as new technologies begin to imbed in pharma and the industry reimagines the art of the possible with potential new drugs targets identified using far large data sets and computational analysis. In terms of manufacturing, drugs could be individually 3D printed to a patient’s requirements—dose, release profile and combinations. In generics, overall growth is predicted to continue to expand rapidly, but with the caveat that faster approvals are need to improve time to market and patient benefit.

Alan Sheppard, principal, global generics at IMS Health said that we will now see fewer generic opportunities in the short term (2016-2020) due to a lower number of significant small molecules losing exclusivity. The U.S. will understandably remain as the single largest profit generator, particularly in terms of margin, however China is set to become the second largest market by 2020. Japan is likely to achieve its 80% generics usage goal ahead of its 2021 target, with Europe remaining the most competitive and leading in the use of biosimilars.

Dilip Shah, chief executive officer, Vision Consulting, warns of potential drag factors on the rapid utilization of generics, imploring the industry to look towards the use of a single reference product for generics like is the case for approval of patented drugs rather than using data from each market, as this slows down approvals and increases costs.

Ultimately, Mr. Shah advocates that the industry and regulator need to work more closely together, not just in terms of meeting diktats—regulatory standards—but also in terms of training and implementation and believes that ‘capability building’ and regulatory convergence will begin to occur over the next 3-years.

In the longer term, Emil Ciurczak of Doramaxx Consulting foresees revolutionary changes in how the industry manufacturers final dosage forms for the patient. His prediction is that the natural evolution of emerging technologies like continuous processing is the application of 3D printing. Using 3D printing the industry will be able to individualize dosage forms—printing on demand for orphan drugs—combining two or more active ingredients together in a single tablet, and using complex layers to alter the release profile.

In the more immediate future 3D printing should be used to standardize the United States Pharmacopoeia tester tablets. He added, “3D printing will expand due to the growth of personalized medicines and medical devices. A synergy between 3D and CM is also a potential, where formulations are developed on CM units and produced on 3D units, as needed.”

Bikash Chatterjee, president and CSO at Pharmatech Associates, sees some equally transformational applications the emerging field of big data will bring to pharma. “Big data will become the underlying foundation behind all electronic control and governance strategy, from product development and supply change management to business continuity,” he said.

In the more immediate future, he sees e-clinical trial applications continuing to expand through 2020 and big data analytics playing an increasingly role in the search for the next big blockbuster. He concluded, “The next decade of therapeutic drug development will be based upon new and more effective means of data mining and data analytics.”

Chris Kilbee, group director pharma, CPhI Worldwide, said, “In the last few years there has been a notable shift in the industry and increasingly pharma customers, both generic and patented manufactures, are looking for new technologies and approaches – be that regulatory, digital or manufacturing.

For a copy of the full articles in the CPhI Annual Report 2016, released at CPhI Worldwide in Barcelona (4-6th October), please visit www.cphi.com/europe/cphi-annual-report.