While Western drugmakers have been looking for ways to tap the Indonesia market, a local company has expanded with a new plant to make generics of biologics.
Indonesia's largest pharmaceutical company, Kalbe Farma, has invested about $35 million in the new facility, which just opened on an 11,000-square-meter site in an industrial zone in Cikarang, east of Jakarta, Nikkei reports.
The plant has started production trials and expects to begin commercial production of hormone treatment erythropoietin at the end of the year. In 2016, Kalbe created a joint venture with South Korea’s Genexine in which the biotechnology R&D company will develop the products and Kalbe will produce them.
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Some Western drugmakers have also already made moves to get in on what they see as upside potential in the country. In 2013, Fresenius Kabi bought controlling interest in Indonesian drugmaker Ethica Industri Farmasi and then started in on a $60 million plant to make IV generic drugs and infusion solutions. Fresenius Kabi claims to be the market leader in IV generics in Indonesia.