South Korea’s JW Holdings has signed an agreement to export its parenteral nutrition (PN) products to U.S. Baxter Healthcare, becoming the first Asian company to land clinical nutrition in the American market.

Under the agreement, JW Life Science, a wholly owned subsidiary of JW Holdings, will develop and provide new PN products for Baxter, which will be responsible for local distribution and marketing in the U.S. market.

Additional details about the products and financial terms were not disclosed.

Many Asian pharmaceutical companies have so far entered American and European pharmaceutical markets with tablets, capsules, ampoules, and vials, but there has been no case in clinical nutrition before JW Group.

Hospitalized patients can develop malnutrition and may require parenteral nutrition therapy when they cannot be fed orally or enterally.

Given the nature of intravenous supply, PN products require strict quality control in every stage of manufacturing. For this reason, only a handful of Korean pharmaceutical companies such as JW Pharmaceutical and Chong Kun Dang are engaged in the market.

The basic parenteral infusion and PN market in Korea is valued at some 400 billion won ($328.7 million).

JW Holdings and Baxter also agreed to redefine their scope of cooperation in global business over the former’s Finomel (launched as Winuf in Korea), a three-chamber total parenteral nutrition product.

As a result, Baxter’s rights to sell Finomel will be limited to Europe, Oceania, the Middle East, and North Africa while JW Group will hold the rights for the remaining area around the world, allowing it to directly export the product to Asian countries with proximity advantages.

JW Holdings shares closed 0.18 percent higher at 5,530 won on Wednesday in Seoul trading, while JW Life Science finished 0.27 percent lower at 18,750 won.

By Seo Jin-woo and Minu Kim

[ⓒ Pulse by Maeil Business Newspaper & mk.co.kr, All rights reserved]