Suboxone sales down as opioid addiction drug market intensifies

By Dan Stanton

- Last updated on GMT

Related tags Opioid

Suboxone is losing market share to a growing number of opioid addiction treatments
Suboxone is losing market share to a growing number of opioid addiction treatments
Opioid addiction drug Suboxone lost market share in 2014 according to newly independent Indivior, whose management says it is not intimidated by increased competition.

The former Reckitt Benckiser drug unit - which spun off in December - reported full year Suboxone (buprenorphine and naloxone) sales of $1.1bn (€1bn), which is down 8% from the previous year.

Indivior CFO Cary Claiborne told investors the revenue decline was despite a double digit increase in units sold, explaining that market pressures had forced the firm to slash prices.

“We continue to have pricing pressures as a result to generic tablets being on the market and branded competition as well,”​ he told investors. Furthermore, this has led to Indivior’s market share in the US dropping from 67% in 2013 to 58% last year.

In 2013, two generic sublingual tablet versions of the drug made by Actavis and Amneal were launched in the US, a third made by Roxane Laboratories arrived last year, and a version made by Teva has just been launched.

Orexo’s Zubsolv sublingual tablet and Biodelivery Science’s Bunavil buccal film offer further branded options to patients.

CEO Shaun Thaxter admitted that his firm is “most likely to continue to lose market share”​ but remained upbeat, especially as the market grows:

“Competition continues to intensify, but we’re not intimidated by that,” ​he said. “In the last quarter, Roxane took a lot of market share away from Actavis and this tells us that price discounting in the market is intensifying as there weren’t any supply issues.”

Suboxone

Furthermore, Orexo had a very disappointing first year, he said, taking just a 4.5% share cut.

Indivior (RB) withdrew its Suboxone tablet in the US, and now only markets a version of the drug delivered using Film technology developed by MonoSol Rx which was approved in 2010. The film carries highly uniform doses of the API which quickly dissolves under the tongue.

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