Hanmi Pharmaceutical said it aims to earn 100 billion won ($85 million) from the sales of Rosuzet – a treatment of dyslipidemia – as part of its efforts to make 2020 a “year of the new challenge.”

Hanmi Pharmaceutical's headquarters in Songpa-gu, southern Seoul

Hanmi has independently developed the new compound drug. It is a super- blockbuster drug that recorded the sales of growth of double-digit rate every year since its release in 2015.

Rosuzet recorded the sales of 77.7 billion won last year, four years after its launch, and ranked first and seventh place, respectively, in the dyslipidemia compound drug market and out-of-the-box prescription drug market, respectively. It also ranked second in the entire dyslipidemia market, comprising both single and compound drugs.

“The robust performance is owing to the widespread views within the medical community that the lower the level of low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C), the better for preventing cardio-cerebrovascular disease as well as that the clinical effectiveness of ezetimibe has been confirmed,” Hanmi said.

Medical workers have shown increased interest in Hanmi’s compound drug which combined ezetimibe and rosuvastatin, I added,

“We developed and launched Rosuzet with our technology, and have since continued to promote it through the provision of sufficient clinical data and energetic communication,” the company said in a press release.

"Ezetimibe, one of the two primary components of Rosuzet, complements the shortcomings of statin that have been used for treating dyslipidemia for a long time, which explains why Rosuzet is gaining popularity, " CEO Woo Jong-soo said.

Rosuzet's potential is expanding further because of continuous confirmation of ezetimibe's clinical utility. Rosuzet is more effective in reducing LDL-C compared to a single-component drug, reducing LDL-C levels by more than 50 percent in all doses.

Hanmi is working with Merck Sharp and Dohme (MSD) to win sales permission in various countries. Among the countries, Mexico and Argentina are likely to approve the therapy this year. Hanmi is responsible for R&D and production while MSD is responsible for global marketing and sales, it said.

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