The global pharmaceutical market sale had reached nearly one trillion U.S. dollars.
North America is responsible for the largest portion, generating more than 40 percent of the sale. The global pharmaceutical market could be worth nearly $1.6 trillion by 2020.
Demand for medicines is rising rapidly in the growth markets (China, Brazil, Russia, India, Mexico, Turkey, Poland, Venezuela, Argentina, Indonesia, South Africa, Thailand, Romania, Egypt, Ukraine, Pakistan and Vietnam). In the past 10 years, over 300 medicines have been approved.
Taiwan's pharmaceutical industry generated total revenues of NT$83.2billion in 2014.
To ensure a smooth transition to a knowledge-intensive economic model, the Biotech and New Pharmaceutical Development Act was legislated on July 6, 2007 to promote the development of knowledge-intensive industries such as new drugs investigation and high-level medical devices development, and to drive the transformation of Taiwan’s economy.