Dubai is poised to play an increasing role in the global pharmatech industry with the UAE pharmaceutical sector's value is set to double in the next four years, a senior official has said.

The UAE’s pharmaceutical industry, which is valued at over Dh11 billion ($3 billion), is expected to almost double to Dh21 billion ($5.7 billion) by 2020.

The global demand for pharmaceuticals and the increasing expenditure on healthcare, is helping Dubai consolidate its position in the global pharmatech ecosystem, said Marwan Abdulaziz Janahi, executive director of Dubai Science Park.

Speaking at the Healthcare Investment Middle East and North Africa (Mena) in Dubai, Marwan Abdulaziz Janahi, executive director of Dubai Science Park, said: “The regional healthcare industry has grown exponentially, and sustained investment in world-class infrastructure means we are now in a unique position to be able to attract some of the world’s leading companies and experts in the field of pharmaceutical manufacturing and pharmatech to Dubai Science Park.”

“Many of these companies are leading the way when it comes to research and development, and is one of many reasons why our business community has grown to more than 300 companies,” he said.

Investments in healthcare infrastructure has enabled opportunities for global and regional manufacturers who benefit from Dubai’s location to reach the rest of the Middle East region, he said.

Over the last decade, Dubai Science Park has created an ecosystem to enable the growth of the emirates’ life sciences business community, and established new benchmarks for infrastructure available to business partners.

This has resulted in the rise of a thriving community of healthcare professionals who benefit from a robust regulatory environment and one of the highest per-capita medicine expenditures in the world.

Janahi’s remarks came during a panel discussion on the relationship between the pharmaceutical manufacturing and supply chains, where the discussion mainly focused on how investors can maximise emerging opportunities in manufacturing and pharmatech in the region’s healthcare sector.

A report published by BMI expects these sectors to contribute to a regional life sciences industry that could be worth Dh69.3 billion ($18.8 billion) by 2019, equivalent to 37 per cent growth from Dh50.7 billion ($13.80 billion) in 2014. As companies take advantage of innovative new trends in the industry, the region could be braced for a spate of mergers and acquisitions, which amounted to $520 billion in 2014, according to Deloitte.

Janahi said: “At present, most of the world’s top multinational pharmaceutical companies have set up regional headquarters and manufacturing plants in the UAE, and we are privileged to call some of them our partners.”

“Together with Pfizer, Bayer, Amgen and Medtronic, to name a few, we have built a strong and healthy ecosystem that will see a myriad of medicinal manufacturing plants to come online by 2020 which, in turn, will enable us to actively contribute to the National Innovation Strategy launched by HH Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, aiming to propel the UAE among one of the most innovative nations in the world within the next five years,” he added.

The panel discussion also focused on building supply chains and market dynamics, including imports, local production, branded and generics products; market trends, patents, and the opportunities that are emerging in cardiovascular, oncology, cancer, cellular, small molecules, biology and other fields.

Dubai Science Park is set to mark the next milestone in the UAE’s ever-evolving generic medicines sector, with the launch of the first local start-up in January 2017, which will develop, manufacture and market branded generic pharma products in the Middle East.  

The thriving business community, together with the region’s rapidly expanding populations and rising cost of healthcare are behind forecasts that the GCC healthcare sector could grow to $71.3 billion by 2020, according to a report published by Alpen Capital earlier this year.

Following his attendance at the Healthcare Investment Mena, Janahi represented Dubai’s life sciences sector at the recently concluded first International Congress of Jordan Food & Drug Administration. Guided by this year’s theme, he spoke on ‘Opportunities and Future Vision in the Pharmaceutical Sector’, highlighting the latest developments being driven by Dubai Science Park, it stated. – TradeArabia News Service