KUALA LUMPUR (July 15): Pharmaniaga Bhd is to collaborate with China-based Suzhou Ronnsi Pharma Co Ltd to commercialise a halal ovine-based (sheep and goat) anti-coagulant blood clot thinner.
A memorandum of collaboration (MoC) was inked between the pharmaceutical company's wholly-owned subsidiary Pharmaniaga LifeScience Sdn Bhd and Ronnsi at a signing ceremony held on Friday (July 15).
Pharmaniaga group managing director Datuk Zulkarnain Md Eusope said the partnership will serve as a catalyst for parties to open up trade routes between their pharmaceutical products, research and development and subsequently perform fill and finish manufacturing of the halal ovine anti-coagulant.
"Currently, Pharmaniaga is working with Ronnsi to import and eventually manufacture the halal anti-coagulant derived from the ovine source.
"In tandem, we will submit collating documents to the National Pharmaceutical Regulatory Agency (NPRA) for its approval soon," he said.
Zulkarnain noted that the process of registering the product with the NPRA as well as materialising the processes of procuring the raw materials and manufacturing the ovine-based anti-coagulant drug is expected to be completed by 2024.
According to Zulkarnain, anti-coagulant usage in Malaysia has "increased drastically" from 2021 to 2022, and its usage has been extended to prevent severe complications of Covid-19 during the pandemic.
"Anti-coagulant is widely used to prevent deep venous thrombosis; a condition of harmful blood clots formed in the blood vessels and is given as prophylaxis (treatment to prevent disease) for planned surgery compared to non-anti-coagulant.
"We see that the anti-coagulant has been in demand due to the rise of Covid-19 cases over the last two years. According to the market forecast captured in IQVIA Data 2021 for anti-coagulant in Malaysian Market Report, a foundation in data specialised across the healthcare ecosystem, it shows that the market is expected to reach eight million dosage units by 2026," he added.
Zulkarnain noted that globally, anti-coagulant is made from pig intestine extracts, which therefore renders it as non-halal.
The pharmaceutical company claimed that the ovine-derived halal variant to be commercialised via the MoC is to be positioned as Malaysia's first halal blood anti-coagulant.
"Although the use of anti-coagulant is high globally due to routine procedures in most surgeries, an equal number doses are used amongst the population in most developed countries.
"However, the usage of anti-coagulant has been relatively low in Muslim countries due to more porcine sources (pig) and less acceptance as preventive therapy," he noted.
Via the MoC, Pharmaniaga will be the exclusive product registration holder, marketing and distribution partner with Ronnsi as the product owner and developer.
At 12.08am, Pharmaniaga shares gained one sen or 1.65% to 61.5 sen, giving the group a market capitalisation of RM805.62 million.