JAMP Pharma Licenses 5 Biosimilar Candidates From Alvotech for Canadian Market

This week, Alvotech and JAMP Pharma announced a partnership to commercialize 5 biosimilars in the Canadian market; terms of the agreement were not disclosed, but the statement said JAMP Pharma has the exclusive rights to commercialize Alvotech’s biosimilars in Canada.

The current market value of the branded sales for these biosimilars is estimated to exceed $2 billion annually, the companies said. Under the terms of the agreement, Alvotech will be responsible for full development and commercial supply of the biosimilars from their new manufacturing facility in Reykjavik, Iceland.

Last month, Alvotech reached an agreement with Israel-based Kamada Ltd to commercialize 6 biosimilar products in Israel once the products gain local regulatory approval. In 2019, Alvotech formed several additional partnerships; in November, the drug maker announced that it has entered into an exclusive partnership with Germany-based Stada to commercialize 7 biosimilars—including autoimmune, oncology, ophthalmology, and inflammatory disease therapies—in Europe. In September, it announced a contract manufacturing partnership with Singapore’s Prestige Biopharma. Finally, in April, it announced a deal with Fuji Pharma to sell a biosimilar ustekinumab in Japan.

“We are very excited and proud to announce our partnership agreement with JAMP,” said Mark Levick, chief executive officer of Alvotech. “With JAMP’s strong commercial background and experience within the Canadian market, we have further opened our network to help realize our continued goals, which is to benefit patients and give them access to high quality biosimilar medicines. We look forward to working with JAMP in achieving our milestones and setting a new standard in biosimilars.”

Louis Pilon, chief executive officer of JAMP, said the deal “will allow the JAMP Pharma Group to become a major player and partner in this market while continuing to expand our traditional generic portfolio, which should surpass 500 products by 2022. We now have six biosimilars in our short-term new product pipeline, and this will have a positive impact on both the company’s future and patient access to these important medicines. The JAMP Pharma Group continues to be driven by our desire to offer more affordable options to Canadian patients.”

The sixth biosimilar referenced by Pilon is teriparatide, which is a biosimilar of  Forteo, for the treatment of osteoporosis in patients at high risk for fractures, a JAMP spokeswoman said; the 5 licensed biosimilars have not yet obtained regulatory approval in Canada, where some provinces have begun mandatory switching programs for patients taking reference products.

“When products will be commercialized, we expect to support patients via our JAMP care program. In addition, we encourage patients to visit website such as the one that is provided by ACE (Arthritis Consumer Experts) who has done fantastic work to help patients better understand biosimilars and the transition process to a biosimilar,” JAMP said in an email to The Center for Biosimilars^®.