Diabetes Defeater

Novo Nordisk has the broadest diabetes product portfolio in the industry, including the most advanced products within the area of insulin delivery systems.

A midst competition from the local companies and selling at competitive price, Novo Nordisk India Pvt Ltd continued to lead the Indian human insulin market with a share of over 65 percent. Its sales revenue during 2005-06 registered a growth of over 44 percent to Rs 195 crore against last year's sale of Rs 135 crore, which is higher than the growth of the insulin market in India. The company says that the growth is mainly because of the competition in the local market, which has brought about increased awareness among diabetics on the use of therapeutic products.

In May 2006, Novo Nordisk India launched its long-acting insulin Levemir in India to aid glycaemic control for people with Type 1 and Type 2 diabetes cases in the country. The insulin is delivered to the patient through a pen-like mechanism. Novo Nordisk's FlexPen is priced at Rs 930 for a 300 ml pen, on par with other analogues in the market. Levemir is a novel predictable basal insulin analogue with a unique mechanism of prolonging action. A fatty acid attached to the insulin molecule enables Levemir to bind the albumin that helps maintain the blood glucose levels in a predictable range. As part of the launch efforts, Novo Nordisk has increased its sales force that will cover over 30,000 doctors manning diabetic clinics in the country to recommend the use of the new basal insulin over traditional therapies. Novo Nordisk India will import Levemir from Denmark. The company expects to capture one-fourth of India's basal insulin market in the year 2007.

Besides marketing a portfolio of therapeutics products like NovoPen 3, Novolet and Flexpen, Novo Nordisk is set to conduct three global clinical trials during 2006 in India on future products. The company has two ongoing trials and is looking at conducting three more trials during 2006. The clinical studies would be phase III trials for GLP-1 analog products, used in the treatment of diabetes. It will be conducted on close to 200 patients at sites across the country.

Novo Nordisk India has entered into an agreement with TCS, for the implementation of an offshore clinical operations service. TCS will provide a suite of data management services, which include designing, capturing, and coding of trial data gathered from clinical trials that are run by Novo Nordisk across the world, out of its modern BPO facility in Mumbai. Novo Nordisk is actively working on its outsourcing strategy and already has a number of agreements in place in India.

Novo Nordisk India also signed an agreement with Torrent Pharma in August 2005 to establish a new and dedicated formulation and packaging facility for Insulin, exclusively for Novo Nordisk. The facility will cater to the increased demand for Novo Nordisk Insulin products in India and will incorporate state-of-the-art technology in formulation, filling, inspection and packaging of Novo Nordisk insulin formulations. The new plant would meet Novo Nordisk India's estimated requirements in the future. All of NN vial formulations for the Indian market are expected to be manufactured at Torrent's facility.

Torrent is the sole manufacturer of Insulin Formulations for Novo Nordisk in India. The domestic formulation at Torrent Pharma will be done with the same state-of-the-art technology and quality standards as practiced across the world by Novo Nordisk. Novo Nordisk India along with Torrent was one of the first companies in the country to initiate formulation of Human Insulin.