Drugmaker AstraZeneca is betting on Russia and China rather than India to propel its expansion into emerging markets because of their safer intellectual property protection and higher prices. "We are putting additional investment into Russia," Chief Executive David Brennan told Reuters during the St Petersburg International Economic Forum, Russia's answer to Davos.
"We've made a commitment to China. India less so - it's a different kind of market ... a lower priced market," he said. The Anglo-Swedish company has said it expects emerging markets to account for at least 25 percent of group sales by 2014, up from 16 percent in 2010.
Its strategy was underlined by plans to build a new research centre in Russia's second city of St Petersburg, announced on Thursday, to compliment a $150 million manufacturing facility in the Kaluga region. "Life expectancies in Russia are 15 years shorter than in a developed country. That's a big difference. There is a lot of opportunity to improve access to healthcare and the government is committed to doing it," Brennan said. Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has targeted the pharmaceutical industry as one of the key components to his plans to diversify the economy away from oil and gas.
Russia has won recent pledges of investment from the likes of Pfizer, GlaxoSmithKline, Novartis, Sanofi, Teva and Novo Nordisk. Government support has also been offered in China, which is expected to become the world's second biggest pharmaceuticals market after the United States in 2015.
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