Rheumatoid arthritis treatment Humira will assume Lipitor’s crown as the world’s biggest selling drug, while Pfizer will cling on to its ranking as the biggest seller of prescription medicines through to 2016, according to the World Preview 2016 report published by EvaluatePharma.

Lipitor’s patent expiry this year precipitates the steepest decline in the industry’s patent cliff, with $139 billion predicted to be lost from sales of branded drugs between 2011 and 2016, equal to 20% of the global pharmaceutical market last year.

The race for the pharmaceutical sales top spot is going to be close, with Sanofi and Novartis competing with Pfizer – all three companies are expected to have prescription drug sales of approximately $50 billion by 2016.
 
Despite predictions that sales of its prescription drugs are set to decline from $54.1 billion last year to $51.2 billion by 2016, Pfizer is expected to cling on to the industry’s top spot.
 
Sanofi’s $20 billion acquisition of Genzyme, predicted growth in emerging markets and its vaccines business boosted the outlook for the French group’s pharmaceutical revenues; forecast sales in 2016 of $50.2 billion are $11.2 billion higher than in the same analysis conducted in April 2010.
 
Prospects for Novartis’ pharmaceutical business have been boosted by key regulatory approvals multiple sclerosis pill Gilenya and Tasigna, a follow-on product to Glivec.

Estimated global sales of Lipitor of $10.6 billion means 2011 will be the last year the cholesterol-lowering agent tops the rankings, with Humira expected to be the biggest selling medicine in 2012 with sales of $8.7 billion. Humira is forecast to grow 5% annually to reach $9.7 billion by 2016.
 
 Release Date: June 28, 2011
Source: EvaluatePharma Ltd