Core tips: In the next decade, pharmaceutical packaging companies will have to face the pressure of many factors: users require packaging to have additional safety and adaptability, expanded adjustment reports and documents, and cost-effectiveness ratio, etc., and the complexity of packaging design will increase.

The pressure comes from new end users, legislation and regulations, and increasingly fierce competition in the pharmaceutical industry. In the next decade, as pharmaceutical companies begin to produce drugs for a small range of people, packaging companies will have to take corresponding measures, such as providing a small number of highly specialized packaging systems. The population decline, the change of medical care payment mode, and the adjustment trend of finance and products will also have a continuous impact on packaging in the next decade. Experts predict that only those packaging innovators who introduce new packaging platforms and strive to meet the needs of these trends can become market leaders. However, small companies will benefit from the emergence of biological products and personalized drugs, and they will also usher in new market opportunities. If they can seize the opportunities, small enterprises will also have great potential. Multiple factors affect more and more elderly people, which will have an important impact on the packaging of drugs in the future. The loss of exercise ability, muscle strength and eyesight will directly affect the design and manufacture of pharmaceutical packaging. The memory of the elderly decreases, but they also take a large amount of drugs every day, which is an important factor causing medication errors. Packaging design also needs to consider these situations. While meeting the expanding elderly market, the drug packaging industry must also meet the requirements of children. Packaging must play an important role in preventing medication errors and improving adaptability. The packaging industry is under increasing pressure from both the government and private stakeholders, who are demanding to improve packaging to reduce drug use errors. In November 2000, the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) proposed a new format for the labeling of prescription drugs. On April 18, 2001, the United States Department of Labor and the United States Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) revised the standards for the control of blood infectious pathogens and set more requirements for the selection of safe needle equipment. In June 2001, NCCMERP (National Drug Misuse Notification and Prevention Coordination Committee) recommended the use of standard bar codes on drugs to reduce errors and improve patient care. In just two years, a series of laws and regulations have put forward new requirements for drug packaging. The interaction between biological drugs and packaging is more obvious. With the increase of the number of biopharmaceuticals and the international harmonization of regulations, countries will require biopharmaceuticals with higher standards, and the adjustment and review of the packaging of biopharmaceuticals are also increasing. In short, the new regulations require safer drug products, drug packaging to protect children, and stricter packaging policies. These requirements, as well as the packaging of more complex drugs, such as biological drugs, require packagers to provide innovative product solutions while maintaining low prices. Unlimited business opportunities in the future At present, the pharmaceutical packaging industry with a scale of US $15 billion worldwide has shown a historic low growth. However, in the next decade, the changes in drug types and the packaging requirements they bring provide new opportunities for the expansion of the packaging market, including: container components and coatings made of new materials, packaging systems that improve adaptability and reduce drug use errors (such as blister packaging), overall solutions for biological drug packaging, combined diagnosis/drug packaging, etc. In this decade, there will be more global packaging companies. These companies can not only provide low-cost packaging services worldwide, but also meet the packaging needs of biological drugs in the future.

There are several ways to expand the packaging market in the next decade. Companies that are expected to expand their market share should have the following characteristics:

● Provide comprehensive commercial services including bio-pharmaceutical packaging. These companies will benefit from the rapid growth of these pharmaceutical products.

● Adopt packaging innovation to meet the new packaging requirements and maintain the current price level.

● Become a global packaging company like those customers of global pharmaceutical companies. These companies are most capable of taking effective and efficient response measures globally according to customer requirements.

● For the newly emerging personalized drug market, develop cost-effective packaging services that can be applied in different regions of the world.

● Retain key customers. The competitive restructuring of the pharmaceutical industry has reduced the total number of customers, but the importance of key customers has increased.