Nucleic acid drug market to reach €161bn?

Whilst the market for NA products used as therapeutics is still at an embryonic stage, the report claims the NA therapeutic market will live up to the expectations, unlike many other technologies that have tended to suffer from 'hype' than reality in the early stages.

The report entitled "Nucleic Acid-Based Therapeutics: World Markets, Developments, and Applications," details six types of nucleic acid-based therapeutics that were set to make the most impact. These were antisense, ribonucleic acid inhibition (RNAi), gene therapy, nucleoside analogs, ribozymes, and aptamers.

According to market researchers Kalorama Information, the market is not considered a mature one as there are very few products of this type in the market place. Indeed, the report's author Dr Kenneth Krul commented that "once a force is applied, it will result in a major displacement of current therapeutic products and the expansion of markets in other areas, including viral therapies and neurological disease/injury therapies."​

Together, the seven major world healthcare markets, United States, Germany, Japan, France, United Kingdom, Italy and Spain account for approximately 64 per cent of the $492 billion in pharmaceutical sales in the world,

Kalorama thought the current world market for nucleic acid therapeutics was small, estimating it at about $1 billion - $5 billion (€769 million - €3.8 billion), its size being an unfair representation of what could be achieved by nucleic acid-based therapeutics. A slower-than-expected development of technology and products in this area, particularly antisense and gene therapy was thought to be responsible.

Kalorama​ identified the greatest market potential in the area of neurological diseases ($83 billion), followed by cancer ($44 billion) and autoimmune diseases ($42 billion).

Each of these markets represented only about 50 per cent of the potential for neurological disease treatments. Fourth in this progression is cardiovascular disease ($33 billion), a major cause of death in all of the seven major world healthcare markets. Lastly, diabetes ($6 billion) and rheumatoid arthritis ($3 billion) completed the total.

In identifying the industry associated with nucleic acid-based therapeutics, Kalorama identified small biotechnology or biopharmaceutical companies, which had products on the market.

Larger companies, though few in number, have entered into collaborations. Some of which proved fruitful in terms of leading to clinical development.

An example is Pfizer, which took an early interest in the development of nucleic acid-based therapeutics and "rational drug design." (Pfizer bought Agouron Pharmaceuticals as part of this interest.)

Several trends and factors were identified that were expected to influence the growth of the nucleic aid-based therapeutics market making it an attractive expansion opportunity for the pharmaceutical industry.

The report predicted that the technologies associated with nucleic acid-based therapeutics were sufficiently fundamental that they may address a broad range of applications.

While progress in antisense has been slow but constant, it is likely that this technology will make major strides over the next five years. The report also predicted that RNAi/siRNA technology was currently the "hot property" in NA-based therapeutics, it is still very much in its early stages of development with obstacles to its commercialisation yet to be overcome.

The number of companies involved in the development of nucleic acid-based therapeutics was also expected to increase over the next two years, largely based on RNAi technology and nucleoside analogs, after which the population is expected to stabilize and decline.