Roquette focuses on “patient-friendly” dosage forms

31 Oct 2017 --- Following the launch of its new market segment focusing on nutritional and dietary supplements, Roquette is seeking to respond to consumer preferences for nutritional supplements by targeting patient-friendly dosage forms based on natural ingredients. This is according to Kelsey Achenbach, Head of Marketing – Pharma at Roquette, who spoke to NutritionInsight at CPhI in Frankfurt. 

Roquette announced the purchase of Itacel – marking its first acquisition in the pharmaceutical excipients market in May this year. At the time, the company announced that the acquisition of Itacel would reinforce Roquette’s position as a “major supplier to the pharmaceutical industry and a global leader in natural-based pharmaceutical excipients solutions,” and that the combination of the two businesses would contribute to its strategic growth plan in the Food, Nutrition and Health markets.

Fitting in with patient-friendly trend
“Our products can be used in anything that’s chewable, suckable, melts in your mouth, dissolves in your mouth or dissolves in water,” Achenbach explained. “This is a trend we’re seeing as more and more companies are focused on treating pediatrics and geriatrics with dosage forms where you don’t have to swallow a pill, but it’s more patient-friendly.”

Roquette’s has specific products that are already set to fit in with the trend toward convenient dosage forms, according to Achenbach. “We have mannitol and sorbitol, which are two of the main products that have that dissolving feature,” Achenbach said.

“We also have a lot of products that are used in tableting and making capsules,” Achenbach added. “The platforms that we’re targeting are mainly nutritional supplements, but we also see a lot of over-the-counter medications that are using these dosage forms.”

Roquette sees challenges and opportunities
One of the challenges that Roquette currently sees comes in the form of the fragmentation of the market.

“You do have a couple of large global players, but for the most part, each region has a lot of very small manufacturers,” Achenbach explained. “So one of the challenges we have is the ability to reach all of those manufacturers, let them know what we do and let them know the solutions that we have.”

However, the company also sees a lot of opportunities in the market for innovation and to help its customers be able to reach their consumers.

“All of our products are based on natural ingredients and so we offer our customers the ability to have labeling such as non-GMO, wheat free, vegetarian, and those are very important for the consumers today,” Achenbach concluded.