Case Study: Pricing of Biosimilar – A present Trend in US market

We will look into a case study to understand present market trends as far as the pricing of the biosimilars are considered in US market.

Case of Pricing of Multiple Remicade Biosimilar

Innovator Biologic
Johnson & Johnson’s rheumatoid arthritis drug Remicade
Remicade had U.S. sales of $4.8 billion last year.

Biosimilar 1

• Inflectra By Pfizer
• 2016 Inflectra launched at 15% discount to J&J’s Remicade Price and later part discount extended to 20%.

Biosimilar 2

• Renflexis by Merck and South Korea’s Samsung Bioepis.
• Expected to enter into the market in July 2017.
• Got US biosimilar approval in April 2017.

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Market Scenario:

• Merck sells the branded version of Remicade outside the United States. In Europe, it is already facing competition from biosimilar Remicade and cheaper versions of other medicines in the class.
• As with generic medicines, once multiple biosimilars of a drug become available prices are expected to drop more quickly.
• J&J offers a variety of discounts and rebates off the list price of Remicade, giving it an average sales price of $808.87 per 100mg vial.
• J&J’s Janssen unit sought a preliminary or permanent U.S. injunction to block the Bioepis version, arguing that it infringed three of its patents. A hearing for the lawsuit has yet to be scheduled.
• Renflexis is the first biosimilar available in the United States under a global biosimilars agreement between Merck and Samsung Bioepis, a unit of Samsung BioLogics.