The agreement will see the companies build new good manufacturing practises (GMP) standard manufacturing facilities for the production of pharmaceutical products and diagnostic imaging agents for the local market. Further details of the plants have not been disclosed.
Andreas Fibig, president of Bayer HealthCare Pharmaceuticals, said: "The local production of our products will provide additional momentum to our business development in this growth market.”
Partnerships have become increasingly common since the country launched its Russia 2020 plan for the drug industry.
The policy – unveiled by Vladimir Putin during his most recent inter-Presidential stint as Russian Prime Minister – is designed to reduce the country’s dependence on drug imports and encourage local manufacturing.
As the time Putin said international drugmakers wanting to sell products in Russia would face restrictions if they did not establish manufacturing operations in the country.
The drug industry’s reaction has been to invest in manufacturing capacity either alone like AstraZeneca, Novartis and Teva or through partnerships like GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), which teamed with Binnopharm on vaccine production.
The partnering approach has dominated more recent industry efforts in Russia. In September 2011, for example, Aurobindo Pharma partnered with OJSC Diod on the manufacturing of generic and over-the-counter (OTC) pharmaceuticals and set up a plant in Moscow’s Podolsk district.
ViiV – GSK and Pfizer’s HIV joint venture – partnered with Moscow based manufacturer Binnopharma last November.