PT CKD OTTO Pharmaceuticals, a joint venture between South Korea’s Chong Kun Dang Pharmaceutical Corp. and Indonesia’s PT Otto Pharmaceutical Industries, will export $32 million worth anticancer drugs to Algeria, making headway into Muslim drug market.

The Korean company said on Monday that the joint venture clinched a $32 million anticancer drug supply deal with Saidal Group in Algeria and already shipped its first batch of the drug to the North African country.

Under the supply deal, CKD OTTO will export anticancer injections produced at its factory in Indonesia to Algeria over the next five years until 2026. Saidal has already secured marketing approval of the medicine in the North African country and will supply it to local hospitals.

Shares of Chong Kun Dang were trading 2.64 percent higher at 116,500 won ($98.8) on Monday morning.

CKD OTTO – launched in September 2015 in Indonesia – built an anticancer drug production factory in Cikarang in Indonesia in 2019 and received Good Manufacturing Practice (GMP) certificate from the local authority. The facility has also received Halal certification by Indonesia’s top certification body Majelis Ulama Indonesia (MUI).

Baek In-hyun, head of CKD-OTTO, said that the company’s anticancer drug facility is a site that has secured Halal certificate for the first time in Indonesia, which will pave the way for the Korean pharmaceutical firm’ inroads into other Muslim regions.

By Chung Hee-young and Lee Eun-joo

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