Healthy Skepticism Library item: 11168

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Publication type: news

Datta M.
Novartis Says India's Patent Rules Dissuade Research Investment
Bloomberg News 2007 Aug 8
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601202&sid=aUTo.uwbAtzM&refer=healthcare

Full text:

India’s patent rules don’t adequately protect pharmaceuticals from being copied, and will dissuade Novartis AG from investing in research there, the head of the Swiss drugmaker’s Indian unit said.

Novartis will overlook India’s ``talent pool of scientists’‘ and lower labor costs and invest outside the South Asian country, said Ranjit Shahani, managing director of Novartis India Ltd. A Chennai court this week turned down the company’s challenge to Indian patent law over the country’s rejection of a patent on the best-selling cancer drug Gleevec.

``No global companies have any R&D plans here for sure now, including Novartis,’‘ Shahani said by telephone from Mumbai yesterday. ``There are no plans to set up a research and development center in India under these circumstances. We disagree with the ruling and we are disappointed.’‘

India, which has low costs of production and skilled chemists, has been bypassed by Novartis and other multinational drugmakers for China, where patent laws are stricter. The Basel, Switzerland-based company has committed spending $100 million on a research center in Shanghai and has set up an institute to discover treatments for diseases such as malaria, tuberculosis and dengue fever in Singapore.

To contact the reporter on this story: Mrinalini Datta in New Delhi at mdatta1@bloomberg.net .