Between 2023 and 2025, hundreds of thousands of Type 2 diabetes patients were unable to access semaglutide due to off-label prescriptions for the drugs in individuals seeking weight loss. The GLP-1RA shortage exposed major fragilities in drug manufacturing, although it is one of a plethora of pressures that can affect global pharma supply chains at any time.
2025 was a particularly volatile year for international supply networks of medicines. US President Donald Trump carried out major trade reform via the imposition of tariffs, with a long-term goal of onshoring much of the prescription drugs used in the US. Other geopolitical challenges included the rise of China in the drug development scene, creating a competitive closed market in the country, leading to sluggish revenues for many Western healthcare companies.
Then there was the utilisation of drugs themselves. Prescriptions for GLP-1RAs have soared over recent years, creating significant revenue streams for pharma heavyweights such as Eli Lilly and Novo Nordisk. Both companies have invested billions of dollars in manufacturing networks to keep up with the demand of their products. These investments are ongoing amid the looming entry of oral weight loss drugs; Novo has already won approval, while Lilly still waits for review.
Even “Acts of God” reveal limitations in supply chain agility. A case in point was the severe shortage of IV fluids in the US after damage to Baxter’s North Carolina-based facility during Hurricane Helene in September 2024.
With market dynamics in constant flux, Pharmaceutical Technology spoke with Stefan Verheyden, CEO of Sanner, a German-based CDMO for pharmaceutical and medical device packaging, to discuss how the healthcare industry is built to withstand disruption.
The interview was conducted ahead of Pharmapack Europe, a pharma packaging conference held from 21 to 22 January in Paris.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Stefan Verheyden (SV): Apart from geopolitical challenges, there’s lots of mega-trends in our industry that play an important role. There are emerging markets with increasing health care access and the importance of the biotech care market. The GLP-1RA market meanwhile is a game changer for the packaging industry. Apart from these, pharma outsourcing is playing an increasing role and there is always a focus on sustainability. There’s still a tail effect from the pandemic situation we were in a couple of years ago, and ongoing tariffs, which are creating supply chain challenges. That leads us to a situation where pharma suppliers and pharma companies need to keep adjusting and find ways to overcome those challenges. Challenges are new all the time, just look at what happened with the US and Venezuela recently. I don’t think that will have a massive impact on the pharma industry, but it’s an example as to how quickly things can come into play.
SV: All the players in the primary packaging fields: glass, prefilled syringes, cartridges, they are managing the risk in a way that they have enough production capacity available, but they are also able to ramp up very quickly in different geographical locations. From a pharma perspective, the predominant players make sure that, in collaboration with their external partners, they have more than enough filling capacity in all geography regions. They can set the scene ready for them to be able to answer to any increasing demand.
The counterpart is that, because so many industry players are pursuing GLP-1RA medication because of how lucrative the market is, it might be that CDMOs supplying pharma customers have less capacity left to serve other domains. What is interesting is that with oral versions now being approved, tablet containers will come into play in the supply chain, rather than just injectables.
SV: Anticipation is key. We need to make sure that we position our company for growth amidst all those macroeconomic headwinds, which is not just geopolitical situations, but also tighter pharma budgets. President Trump’s Most Favored Nation (MFN) policy and tariffs have been changing the sector. We are implementing near-shoring and supply chain resilience, because the geopolitical tensions and logistics volatility demand agile operations. We will be strengthening our manufacturing footprint and dual source critical components to ensure continuity and speed. We are diversifying the customer base, because we need to reduce dependency on the large pharma customers that are facing budget restraints today. Then there’s a third pillar of being more like being a service provider rather than being just a product provider. Offering end-to-end CDMO solutions to customers can be a differentiator.
Finally, there are strategic partnerships. We do not want to reinvent the wheel – if there are things that external partners can do better than we do, well, we would prefer to go into a strategic partnership rather than attempt to do everything in house.
SV: China is and remains a very closed market. It’s extremely difficult to get solid market data there. It is extremely difficult to get access to predominant players in the industry. However, they have ramped up so fast in whether this is glass, primary packaging, plastics, or design and development. It’s amazing to see how they have transitioned into a predominant region, that apart from the fact that they are one of the most important regions in bringing new drugs, they have also scaled production to deliver packaging material for the local markets.
Sanner has two facilities in Kunshan. We occupy a predominant position over there. We have been growing that business year over year and are market leaders there for test strip tubes and effervescent materials. Although it is an extremely competitive market, it can also be a very lucrative market. It’s tricky to gain a foothold if you don’t have local access to the market in China. You need to have local production capabilities to play a solid role. Not only from a competitive point of view, but access to local production opens avenues. Chinese customers do not want to simply buy materials coming from Europe. Yes, price competitiveness is probably the biggest challenge we’re facing in China because of the governmental policies, but you must be pragmatic in dealing with it.
“Walking the pharma supply chain tightrope requires more than precision” was originally created and published by Pharmaceutical Technology, a GlobalData owned brand.
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