The Indian health care industry especially pharmaceutical sector is solely devoted towards public health care and is one of the fastest growing sectors.
The total pharmaceutical market in India is growing at an average rate of 10.4 percentage over the year (ORGIMS MAT Feb 2010) with a sales volume of about Rs 35,000 Cr. Although India accounts for 16 percentage of the world’s population, the sales of pharmaceutical market is just 1 percent of the global sales in terms of value and 8 percent in terms volume. Globally, it ranks 4th in volume and 14th in terms of value (OPPI 2009).
It has been assumed that with the current growth India will occupy the 10th position by 2015 by its record sales and with the absolute growth of 14 per cent.
Definitely over the years pharmaceutical industry has shown tremendous growth in terms of infrastructure development, technology base creation and wide range of production and is still having immense potential to grow despite economic recession and narrowing of commodity cycles and has wide scope for skilled technical and scientific manpower.
A majority of management schools includes the curriculum of therotical aspects, as someone has rightly said “Yesterday’s absenteeism is not today’s problem of absenteeism’. As marketing dynamics change periodically with changes in aspects like Social, Economical, Political, Cultural, Technological, Competitive, etc. and hardly any guidance is available to a marketing persons working in the field.
Pharmaceutical industry spends a lot in clinical research programs and with extensive cost in setting marketing network. As a consequence of above all, marketers need to have a fully updated knowledge and information for thorough understanding of this business environment to en-cash the opportunities.
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Pharmaceutical marketing is a vast panorama and has a unique style of functioning, however very few references are readily available on this topic. Hence it is necessary to study emerging trends and visualize various structural reforms in the pharmaceutical marketing in India from a critical point of view. A systematic analysis and evaluation of pharmaceutical marketing is also done here.
Abhijit Dey and others had discussed “Pharmaceutical marketing in India – A microscopic view” which depicts various issues like Marketing functions, Research and Development, Government Policies, etc in-terms of pharmaceutical market in India. The designed structure needs to be further updated in varying degree to examine various issues and growth perspective in Indian pharmaceutical market.
Ames Frass and Sunil Patel “Indian Pharmaceutical Industry” further elaborated the Indian pharmaceutical industry in terms of regulatory environments, import and export trend etc. from theoretical angle. Also it is very true that practical approach towards Indian pharmaceutical marketing helps to draw concrete conclusion and suggest the measure to explore newer opportunities and minimize the risk to sustain in highly competitive environment and preserve marketing ethics.
As per the study conducted by Greg Felker and Shekhar Chowdhari on “The Pharmaceutical Industry in India and Hungary” discussed about the historical perspective of pharma-: ceutical marketing in India. And has a little discussion on opportunities in the field of pharmaceutical marketing. So there is the need for re-strengthening the marketing environment from strategic angle for a sustainable development of Indian pharmaceutical marketing.
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Product, Price, Place, Promotion, and Physical Distribution are the key components of pharmaceutical marketing mix. “Product management in pharmaceutical industry” has summarized with relative reference but it has to be further described in-terms of various strategies related to it to achieve high customer satisfaction.
“Price and profits in the pharmaceutical industry are driving components of pharmaceutical industry” “Certainly other components like pricing policy and strategy are equally important to influence the buyer’s behavior so as to achieve business objectives.
As per the study conducted by Sai Haragopal, “Impact Of Drug Policy 1978 On Bulk Drug Production: A Case Study Of IDPL” had widely stressed on Drug Policies related to bulk drug production but from marketing point of view it is necessary to understand that sale of bulk drugs and formulations increases due to strong distribution network, promotional activities and competitive strategies. ‘
Besides this few references about role of retail chemists is mentioned in the research paper published by A K Saldanhu “Role of Retail Chemists in the Marketing of Self Prescription Pharmaceutical Products” had discussed the importance of marketing of self-prescription products in India.
The discussion concludes that Indian pharmaceutical marketing is very price sensitive, and profits motive play a vital role at, chemist level. Therefore it is necessary to discuss further about various pricing policies and strategies at retail level and suggests the improvements therein.
“Developing employee’s performance through motivational techniques” in pharmaceutical marketing need to sharpen the skills of medical representatives through continuous training and management development programmes to increase the productivity in pharmaceutical marketing.
“Indian pharmaceutical industry will take a new shape after implementation of Product Patent Act” that has been studied and discussed by many other researchers like Ames Gross in their research paper “New Trends in India’s pharmaceutical marketing” but certainly emerging and most significant aspects like important implications, evidences and new horizons opened by product patent Act has to be studied in-depth to draw some concrete and useful suggestions.
The research paper published by Renu K Bhuller about “Overview and Future Directions for pharmaceutical industry: an Asian perspective” puts many issues in focus like effect of Government imposed Price Policies, Intellectual Property Rights, etc. but fails to incorporate the most significant factors such as increasing acceptance of traditional medicinal systems like Ayurveda, Homeopathy, Unani etc has to be studied in-depth to understand the system in total as an emerging challenge and this could be an independent topic for further research.
It is also necessary to include a system to resolve the common problems faced by pharmaceutical marketers for the sustainable development. In the study conducted by Susan Feldman and Ruth Winett about “New Trends In India’s Pharmaceutical Market” concludes that solving information problem in the pharmaceutical marketing is a two way process to face emerging challenges. But it is also necessary to point out the emerging challenges from strategic point of view to minimize the risk.