Non-haematological cancer treatment market to almost double by 2021

The global treatment market for non-haematological cancers will almost double from $72.9 billion in 2014 to $140.8 billion in 2021, according to business intelligence provider GBI Research.

The company’s latest report states that this robust growth will occur in spite of the patent expiries of a number of very commercially successful products, including Avastin, Erbitux and Herceptin. Avastin will see its first expiry in the EU in 2018, with the two others having already experienced EU expiries in 2014.

Adam Bradbury, Associate Analyst for GBI Research, explains: “These drugs are all monoclonal Antibodies (mAbs), and are therefore expected to be less susceptible to market share and price erosion following patent expiry, due to practical and regulatory barriers to entry for biosimilars. In this way, these expirations will not pose too strong a barrier to growth.”

Market drivers will include the increasing prevalence of cancer globally, and the introduction of more targeted treatments, which will improve the overall survival of poor-performance-status patients and enable more rounds of chemotherapy to be administered.

2,954 products in active development

There are 2,954 non-haematological oncology products in active development, 171 of which are in Phase III development or Pre-registration, according to GBI Research.

Bradbury explains: “Although none of the products in the late-stage pipeline are expected to reach the same levels of success as the highest revenue-generating drugs currently in the market, due to the competitiveness of the landscape, there are a number of candidates that are expected to achieve strong sales during the forecast period. These include AZD-4736 and neratinib, which are both forecast to generate blockbuster revenues by 2021.

“A range of companies are actively involved in the development or marketing of these new oncology products, including most of the top 20 pharmaceutical companies, smaller publicly traded companies and privately-held enterprises. In particular, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Johnson & Johnson, Pfizer, and Novartis, are anticipated to maintain their strong market shares throughout the forecast period.

“While Roche’s market share within non-blood cancers is anticipated to decrease, partly due to the approaching patent expiries of Avastin and Tarceva, Roche is still expected to maintain the highest market share for non-hematological cancer treatment of any company throughout the forecast period.”