The future of the pharmaceutical, biological and medical device industry

Lesley J Burgess, Marli Terblanche
TREAD Research/Cardiology Unit, Department of Internal Medicine, Tygerberg Hospital and University of Stellenbosch, Parow, South Africa

Abstract: Numerous factors contribute to the declining pharmaceutical industry on the one hand and the rapidly growing generic industry together with the growing importance of medical devices and biologicals on the other. It is clear that the pharmaceutical industry is going to undergo a change in the next decade in order to meet the current challenges facing it and ultimately sustain its profitability and growth. This paper aims to identify a number of fairly obvious trends that are likely to have a significant impact on the product development pipeline in the next decade. It is more than clear that the current production pipeline for pharmaceutical, biotechnology and medical device industries is no longer sustainable and that urgent interventions are required in order to maintain its current level of profitability.

Keywords: pharmaceutical industry, personalized medicine, trends, generics, biotechnology