To market we go

New therapies set to hit the market in the coming years will transform the options for patients diagnosed with serious ocular conditions, and boost the pharmaceutical industry, a new market research report suggests.

The report by research firm GBI Research highlights that smaller companies are likely to be behind the next transformative ophthalmic medications by the year 2022.

GBI Research picked out Spark Therapeutics – the company aiming to cure choroideremia and other inherited retinal diseases using gene therapy – and Ophthotech, which is expected to release its drug targeting wet age-related macular degeneration (AMD) in 2017.

The glaucoma eye drops that Aerie Pharmaceuticals are developing and the diabetic macular oedema therapy by Eleven Biotherapeutics that is ready for clinical trials were also noted in the report.

The market for ophthalmic therapies – for glaucoma, AMD, diabetic macular oedema, diabetic retinopathy, and dry eye syndrome – was calculated to grow to £20bn by 2022, almost doubling from £10.5bn in 2015.

GBI Research associate analyst, Qaisrah Khalid, highlighted that: “Some of [these biopharmaceutical companies] are anticipated to become key players within this timeframe.”

Mr Khalid said that a successful treatment could see a relatively unknown company overtake the ocular therapy revenues of a big-name player like Roche.

The breakthrough treatments “will help to offset the impact of patent expiries of some of the most commercially successful products of the ophthalmology space, including Lucentis (ranibizumab), Eylea (aflibercept), and Alphagan (brimonidine tartrate),” he concluded.

The full market report is available for purchase on the GBI Research website.