Celltrion announced on the 20th that its biosimilar products have successfully won bids for autoimmune disease treatments in Italy, one of the five major countries in Europe.
First, the Steqeyma® biosimilar of Ustekinumab, launched by Johnson & Johnson (J&J) in January this year, has recently been awarded contracts in the Ustekinumab bids held by the governments of four regions in Italy, including Piedmont, Aosta Valley, Liguria, and Sardinia. Steqeyma is expected to be supplied to these areas until 2028.
The YUFLYMA® biosimilar of Adalimumab, for the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis and psoriasis from AbbVie, has also been successful in bidding. It was awarded in the Adalimumab bids held in regions including Lazio, Lombardy, and Umbria. Starting this month, YUFLYMA will be supplied to Lazio and Lombardy for the next three years and to Umbria for two years.
The REMSIMA® biosimilar of Infliximab from J&J has recently been awarded in the Umbria bids and is expected to be supplied for two years until 2027. The subcutaneous injection (SC) product of REMSIMA, REMSIMA SC, has also created a new market in the Sardinia state government, where there has been no bidding market for the Infliximab SC formulation in Italy. Bidding has become possible across all state governments in Italy.
Yoo Won-sik, head of Celltrion's Italian subsidiary, noted, "As a result of the achievements in bidding by each state government since the transition to direct sales in 2020, our autoimmune disease treatments like the REMSIMA product line and YUFLYMA have maintained their position as the top prescribed products, surpassing competitors," and added, "Since we can utilize the same human and physical network as our existing products, we will continue to carry out more aggressive marketing activities to rise as the prescription leader."