EvaluatePharma has totted up the figures for R&D spend and costs for biopharmas, and the figures are huge: $4 billion per NME over the past decade, with spending on global pharma research to hit $181 billion in five years.
This is according to its “World Preview 2017, Outlook to 2022,” which takes a deep dive into the industry’s figures past, present and future, and finds that spending is up across the board for research and highlights the strengths of Roche as being the leader in R&D spend and pipeline potential in terms of value creation.
On a pipeline product basis, Biogen and J&J are seen by the analysts to have the highest net present value, with the Big Biotech’s phase 3 anti-beta amyloid Alzheimer’s candidate aducanumab seen as having an NPV of more than $10 billion, while the Big Pharma’s apalutamide, a nonsteroidal antiandrogen for prostate cancer, is just under $10 billion NPV, with potential 2022 sales of $1.6 billion.
Global pharma R&D spend is set to hit $157.5 billion this year, on a par with 2016, but is set to jump to $181 billion by 2022; however, current stats from EP show that last year, pharma’s R&D was 20.4% of Rx sales, while in 2022 this is set to decrease to just 17.1%. It said that the cumulative 10-year R&D spend (between 2007-16) was $1.36 trillion.
Looking at the average R&D spend per NME, EP also found that this had hit $4 billion over the last 10 years.
And Swiss major Roche is continuing its strong run and is set to spend the most on research and development in 2022, hitting $9.6 billion.
“Of the top 20, Celgene and Boehringer Ingelheim are forecast to grow their R&D expenses most rapidly, with R&D spending forecast to increase 13% and 6% per year until 2022 respectively,” the report says.
Roche also gains the top spot in the pipeline value creation ranking, which Evaluate sees as “proving its leadership ambitions beyond oncology.” Potential hemophilia blockbuster emicizumab (which has however had some trial problems) and lampalizumab for geographic atrophy (a severe and advanced form of AMD) are seen as having the biggest potential here. EP sees cumulative sales between now and 2022 hitting $24.5 billion.
AstraZeneca, often portrayed as a laggard and beset by pipeline problems, and AbbVie complete the podium, with AZ’s recently approved I-O med Imfinzi and pipeline cancer med tremelimumab, as well as AbbVie’s GnRH antagonist elagolix, ADC oncology candidate Rova-T and JAK1 inflammatory med ABT-494, helping keep these two close to leader Roche.
Novo Nordisk, meanwhile, has the portfolio most expected to yield the highest return on investment (ROI) in the future, according to the report. Novo and Celgene have the largest ROI, 4.8 and 2.7, respectively, with Bayer completing the top three.
“Among the top three pharma companies, Roche is the only one with a ROI higher than 1, while Pfizer and Novartis seem to struggle to capitalize on the large M&A spend,” the report states. It adds that a few selected bolt-on acquisitions could potentially pave the way to higher returns for some companies, notably BMS and Celgene.
By Ben Adams
Source: Fierce Pharma
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