BOGOTA, Colombia – With the recent announcement of the opening of a new office in Mexico City, Mundipharma International Corp. Ltd. is strengthening its presence in Latin America, a region that the Singapore company considers strategic for its business.

"We are very excited to start formal activities in Mexico and bring Mundipharma's valuable expertise in pain relief to the over 28 million people estimated to suffer from chronic pain in the country today," said Raman Singh, president of Mundipharma Asia-Pacific, Latin America, the Middle East and North Africa.

The company is targeting Latin America´s second-largest economy to bring its business to a new level in the developing markets in which it has increased its presence. The fact that chronic and noncommunicable diseases like cancer and diabetes have become the leading cause of illness in Latin America has triggered the interest of Mundipharma to compete for a greater slice of market share in the region, while focusing on pain management products, mainly produced for oncology patients.

"The company plans to introduce several products to treat chronic pain and cancer, each proven to encompass an outstanding degree of effectiveness, reliability and safety," said the company.

Singh´s recent visit to Mexico coincided with the approval of Folotyn (pralatrexate) by the Mexican Federal Commission for the Protection against Sanitary Risks (Cofepris in Spanish). Folotyn is the result of a co-development deal between Mundipharma and Allos Therapeutics Inc., from Westminster, Colo. Allos later was acquired by Spectrum Pharmaceuticals Inc.

"Here in Mexico we are eager to start designing and contributing a portfolio of reliable and high-quality analgesic products to relieve the pain suffered by millions of people and their families," Singh said.

Mundipharma´s move to enter the Mexican market coincides with great efforts being done by authorities to increase the range of biotech products available in the market.

In August, Cofepris approved a package of 32 innovative pharmaceutical products that can now be commercialized in Mexico. Among the products approved is Folotyn for the use in patients with relapsed or refractory peripheral T-cell lymphoma.

With this package of approved innovative drugs, the country has already opened the market to 133 new molecules in the past three-and-a-half years. According to Cofepris, that "represents an increase of 4,333 percent in comparison with the three [molecules] approved in 2010."

"This is the biggest package of new drugs that Cofepris authorized under the Agreement for the Promotion of Pharmaceutical Innovation, for metabolic, oncology, infectious, mental, cardiovascular and rheumatic diseases, among others," the agency said.

Along with Mundipharma´s registration of Folotyn, four other innovative products for cancer treatments were approved. Those include Xofigo (radium Ra 223 dichloride) and Stivarga (regorafenib) from Bayer AG, of Leverkusen, Germany; Halaven (eribulin mesylate) from Eisai Ltd., of Tokyo; and Gazyva (Obinutuzumab) from Roche AG, of Basel, Switzerland.

Innovative vaccines against type A and B influenza, such as the Fluzone Quadrivalent, from Sanofi Pasteur, of Lyon, France, and the Fluzactal Tetra vaccine from London-based Glaxosmithkline plc, were also approved by the Mexican authorities to enter the market.

However, while Mundipharma takes advantage of the Mexican market conditions and of the opening to new biotech products, the company´s ambition in the region goes far beyond Mexico. During a webinar last month in anticipation of the first BIO Latin America conference in Rio de Janeiro, Eduardo Tsuru, director of business development in Latin America at Mundipharma, highlighted that the company expects the region to contribute, with a fifth of the global revenues. (See Bioworld Today, Sept. 4, 2014.)

"Mundipharma is a pain specialist company, but we are also covering other therapeutic areas, such as consumer oncology, hematology and specialty care products, so at a glance, my main target here in Latin America is to contribute with a 20 percent of revenues for the region by 2018," Tsuru said during the webinar. "I have this aspirational number."

Mundipharma is also aiming to strengthen its position as a key player in Colombia, which has recently approved new biotech regulation. It also is expected for the company to enter Ecuador, Chile, Peru and Central America in 2015. (See BioWorld Today, Sept. 23, 2014.)