Celltrion Healthcare logs record-high Q2 revenue on back of Remsima

Celltrion Healthcare Co., South Korean biopharmaceutical giant Celltrion Inc.’s global marketing affiliate, posted its record-high second-quarter revenue on Tuesday.

The marketing affiliate achieved 519 billion won ($396 million) in revenue, 74.1 billion won in operating profit and 39.1 billion won in net profit in the April-June quarter of 2022.

All of its products had similar growth in the global prescription market. Particularly, Remsima (infliximab), targeting anti-inflammatory medication for immune-system diseases, showed a great increase in revenue from the US market, Celltrion Healthcare said.   

The second-quarter revenue increased 19.8% from the same period of 2021, thanks to high-margin products such as Remsima SC, a subcutaneous injection type of the biosimilar.

However, the quarterly operating profit and net profit respectively decreased 2.8% and 38.6% from a year earlier. The declines came as there were no earnings from Celltrion’s COVID-19 treatment Regkirona (regdanvimab) in the second quarter of this year.

Korea’s disease control authorities suspended new supply of Regkirona in February 2022, saying the drug efficacy is low to treat the Omicron variant.  

REMSIMA, OTHER BIOSIMILARS LEAD SALES

Remsima, branded as Inflectra in the US, has been fast-growing in the market since it joined the preferred infliximab product lists of US insurance giants United Healthcare and Cigna in 2021.

Inflectra also posted a 31% share in the US infliximab market in June, according to pharmaceutical industry research firm Symphony Health.  

Both Remsima SC and the intravenous (IV) type Remsima showed increased market share in Europe during the second quarter. The IV and SC products revenue in the European market respectively soared 50% and 160% from a year earlier. 

The company forecasts sales growth of its other drugs, lymphoma treatment Truxima (rituximab-abbs) and breast and gastric cancers drug Herzuma (trastuzumab-pkrb) in Europe. The firm started direct sales of the two biosimilars in the region earlier this second half, aiming to ramp up prescriptions of the drugs.

The Korean biopharma is also set to launch Vegzelma (bevacizumab) in Europe soon. In June, it earned a positive opinion of recommending a marketing authorization from European Medicines Agency (EMA).

For aggressive global marketing, Celltrion has completed a patent agreement with Genentech Inc., the US biopharma which developed the biosimilar’s original drug Avastin.

“The record-high second-quarter revenue has a significant meaning for our growth. Particularly, 27% of the revenue came from Asia and Latin America, which are emerging as the key markets for us. We expect some drugs’ direct sales and launch of new biosimilars will lead the earnings in the second half,” a Celltrion Healthcare official said.

Write to Min-Soo Han at hms@hankyung.com
Jihyun Kim edited this article.