Pharmaceutical Technologist - November 2007 - (Page 4)

*Editor’s comment Can nanotechnology deliver? It seems the message has finally got through to R&D teams — nanotechnology holds the key to unlocking new drugs, extending intellectual property and capturing a slice of a market that has been predicted to be worth $220 billion (€152 million) by 2015. Does all this sound a bit fanciful? To an extent yes because we have heard talk of life-changing nanotechnology in all aspects of drug manufacture and development for years, but with very little actual impact. So what’s changed? Apparently, quite a lot according to London-based nanotech research company Cientifica (www.cientifica.eu) in its white paper The Nanotech Revolution in Drug Delivery, Establishing a New Paradigm in Pharmaceuticals. In it, Cientifica claims that: “By 2012, nano-enabled drug delivery systems (DDS) will capture more than a 15% share of the market from its current potion of 4%. But that is just the beginning. After 2015, nano-enabled technologies will take the lion’s share of the market, making up nearly 90% of the drug delivery market — a complete transformation of the way DDS are formulated.” Additionally, the white paper points out that there are plenty of drugs that pharma manufacturers could release into the market if their drug delivery was nanotech-based, but at the moment the “several hundred billion dollars worth of potential” can only sit and wait. And there are plenty of new commercial partners that have been established simply to provide nano drug delivery only too willing to help; companies such as Nanocarrier (Japan); CeramiSphere Pty Ltd (Australia); Nanovindex Ltd (UK); Aquanova (Germany); Insert Therapeutics (USA); Biophan (USA); Capsulution (Germany); and Flamel Technologies (France). According to lead author Hailing Yu, the four technologies that will change the paradigm of the drug delivery market are nanoparticles (including inorganic, polymer and solid lipid nanoparticles); nanocrystals; polymer therapeutics (including polymer drugs, polymer drug conjugates, polymer micelles and dendrimers) and liposomes. But how close are we to actually seeing some results? Cientifica claims that the nano-based DDS market is already worth $3.39 billion (€2.4 billion), but by 2012 this figure will rise to $26 billion (€18 billion) before the market “explodes” says Tim Harper, Cientifica’s CEO, “through the fruits of today’s R&D in both DDS and nanomaterials feeding through to create a market worth $220 billion by 2015.” A couple of years ago, I suggested the pharmaceutical industry wasn’t doing enough in terms of implementing nanotechnology, so it’s great to see there is a great chance that all the locked up potential will be coming to fruition within the next decade. As manufacturers look to discover new ways of protecting intellectual property, nanotechnology might just hold the key to extending product pipelines and discovering the next generation of blockbusters, proving that sometimes good things do come in small packages. PT Gurminder Marwaha 4 November 2007 l pharmaceutical technologist http://www.cientifica.eu

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Pharmaceutical Technologist Contents Editor's Comment News Morpheus Feeling the Pressure Legal Crusaders The Holy-Grail of Start-Up Biotech Special Feature Q&A

Pharmaceutical Technologist - November 2007

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