(Reuters) -Coherus BioSciences said on Monday it has launched a copycat version of AbbVie’s Humira in the United States at a discount of more than 85% to the blockbuster arthritis drug.
Coherus is the latest to launch a biosimilar to Humira in the U.S. market this month after Boehringer Ingelheim, Sandoz and Organon.
While pills have extremely cheap generic versions, complex, expensive biologics made from living cells cannot be exactly duplicated. Their closest alternatives are called biosimilars.
Coherus said last month it would sell the biosimilar, branded as Yusimry, at $995 per carton, compared with the current list price of Humira of $6,922 per carton.
The company has also partnered with billionaire entrepreneur Mark Cuban’s pharmaceutical startup to sell the biosimilar at $569.27 plus dispensing and shipping fees.
Usually prices fall, often dramatically, when multiple copycat versions of a widely-used medication enter the market.
However, manufacturers of Humira biosimilars are likely to keep prices high, experts have said, to compete with one another for leverage with pharmacy benefit managers, which negotiate insurance coverage on behalf of their customers – large employers and health insurance plans.
Sales of Humira, once the world’s biggest-selling drug, are expected to drop 37% this year but stabilize by 2024 end, the drugmaker said in February.
The drug recorded more than $21 billion in global sales in 2022, with $18.6 billion from the United States.
Shares of Coherus were up 1.6% in premarket trading.
(Reporting by Sriparna Roy and Leroy Leo in Bengaluru; Editing by Shounak Dasgupta and Arun Koyyur)
