Mumbai: Leading Indian drugmakers such as Sun Pharma and Glenmark are exploring the use of AI as a necessary tool to cut the time taken and costs for new drug development. The two drugmakers, in particular, are seeing a growing contribution from their new discovery research programmes in their global revenues as Indian companies see a shifting trend to innovative drugs from generics.Use of AI in pharmaceutical research is already picking up pace across the world. According to Precedence Research, last year global drugmakers invested $6.93 billion in AI for drug discovery, which is expected to swell to $16.5 billion by 2034.Dilip Shanghvi, executive chairman, Sun Pharma, told ET, "We are seriously evaluating how we can get help in terms of expertise which can leverage our capabilities to strengthen research. Key issue is to understand how we can accelerate our drug development process".Glenn Saldanha, chairman, Glenmark Pharma, added that while AI will play an important role in research, in the short term, it will be more applicable in the small molecule (chemistry-based) drug discovery space. "I think biologics will take a little longer, but it will play an important role in the entire research cycle-from clinical trials to molecular modelling or drug design."Last July, IGI, a Glenmark subsidiary, struck a record out-licensing deal valued at $1.9 billion with US drugmaker AbbVie for its drug to treat multiple myeloma (a form of blood cancer) coded ISB2001. Glenmark received an upfront payment of $700 million while staggered milestones are expected as the drug progresses in research.With revenues of ₹52,041 crore last year, Sun Pharma saw 20% revenue contribution from its innovative/new research products.Dilip Shanghvi and Glenn Saldanha were speaking at the flagship ET Pharma Summit in Mumbai last week.Saldanha said in the short term, there is opportunity in saving timelines in analysing phase three clinical trial data and submitting the application to regulatory agencies.Shanghvi noted, "Since the (AI) technology exists and capability exists as well, we need to think how we can leverage all of that so that we can recruit patients faster in phase three studies, complete those studies faster and then go for the (regulatory) filings. All these take close to one and half years and there I see significant value".
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