Report explores trends and opportunities in life sciences

Frost & Sullivan has published its latest research on the global life sciences industry.

Pharmaceutical companies are making significant changes in order to meet challenges presented by the economy, patent expirations and limited drug approvals, a new report has claimed.

Frost & Sullivan's latest analysis of the life sciences sector highlights the increasing adoption of new growth strategies to deal with these issues.

For instance, some companies are switching their focus to complex and hard-to-treat diseases, while others are moving into emerging markets such as the four so-called 'BRIC' economies of Brazil, Russia, India and China.

Meanwhile, companies are trying to save money by doing less of their own research and development, according to the report.

Industry analyst Dr Winny Tan said: "In addition to implementing new growth strategies to face larger economic challenges, pharmaceutical companies are doing less R&D internally than decades ago.

"By externalising much of the development work for drugs and diagnostics, development costs are curbed while organisations are able to leverage outside expertise."

Overall, the research estimates the global life sciences industry to be worth $1.35 trillion, and this is expected to soar to $5.01 trillion by 2015.