Battling with TRIPS: Emerging firm strategies of Indian pharmaceutical industry post-TRIPS

The full scale compliance of TRIPS Agreement essentially represents a big step in the opposite direction as it effectively ended more than three decades of protection for Indian companies and terminated legal 'reverse engineering'. The new Patent regime throws a new challenge to the Indian pharmaceutical industry to maintain its competitiveness and profitability. This study investigates emerging firm strategies of the Indian pharmaceutical companies to overcome the challenge posed by new patent regime. The study concludes that the industry is witnessing a transition Phase, and is undergoing consolidation and restructuring. The industry is adopting a mix of competitive and collaborative business and R&D strategies in the emerging business environment.