[ashray]

They don't do much R&D. Most of their drugs are copies of drugs that have been developed in western countries. The drugs are just reverse engineered and reproduced. This is pretty legal under Indian patent law and hence carries on, while Cipla, makes massive amounts of money by being just a drug manufacturer.

They do save lives though :P

[cdooh]

I meant western companies how much do they send? I once read an article that suggested that even after they've made back the money spent on R&D they still keep their prices high to keep making a profit

[jeffool]

As an example, GlaxoSmithKline spends 8.826M GBP/13.8683M USD on marketing/sales and cost of business, and 4.009 GBP/6.2993M USD on research.

Most of them make this publicly available on their financial reports on their websites.

http://www.gsk.com/investors/reps11/GSK-Annual-Report-2011.p... Page 136

[ams6110]

Well most people are not in business to just break even on their costs.