According to Globocan 2020, in India, Breast Cancer (BC) accounts for 13.5% of the total cancer cases. Amongst known classifications of BC, Her2-positive Breast Cancer compasses about 20 – 30% of the total BC cases. Her2-positive BC turns aggressive if not diagnosed early resulting in lethality amongst patients. The bright side is, Her2 is a targetable biomarker with trastuzumab monoclonal antibody being manufactured to circumvent its oncogenicity in BC patients.
As the biosimilars market has grown over the years, Indian biopharmas have particularly utilized this opportunity to manufacture and market onco-biosimilars across various nations including India. While many different biosimilars have been marketed through Indian biopharma, some including trastuzumab have been deemed as a blockbuster drug.
The first trastuzumab biosimilar in the world was manufactured collaboratively by Mylan and Biocon almost a decade back. Since then many players have manufactured trastuzumab. This includes Dr Reddy’s labs and Intas amongst others.
Just in January 2024, Curateq (A startup subsidiary of Aurobindo Pharma) got approval to market its trastuzumab biosimilar in India. They proved the efficacy (clinical trials) of their biosimilar using more than 650 Her2-positive BC patients. Considering Curateq started just a few years back, it is a remarkable achievement for biopharma’s growth and its success will go a long long way.
Congratulations Curateq!