Pharma company Cipla will continue to perform well on the back of factors like a ramp-up in market share in Albuterol inhaler sales and overall COVID-19 portfolio, said Nithya Balasubramanian, Director at Sanford Bernstein.

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“We are seeing a fairly impressive ramp-up in market share in the generic Albuterol inhaler sales in the US. They are trending at 11-12 percent prescription share and this is likely to be a very substantial product coming in at very high gross margins as well,” she said in an interview with CNBC-TV18.

"Cipla’s India growth will also continue to be buoyed by the overall COVID portfolio," said Balasubramanian.

According to her, there is still some room left for pharma names like Sun Pharmaceuticals, Lupin and Dr Reddy's. "Given that we are seeing a little bit of uptick in market share gains in their (Sun Pharmaceuticals) specialty portfolio, there is room. In terms of Lupin and Dr Reddy’s Laboratories (DRL), we are seeing good growth coming in from the US but the valuations are a little bit stretched now,” she said.

Balasubramanian said that she will watch for sales and marketing expenses of pharma companies ahead of this quarter’s earnings season. “The only thing I am looking forward to is what happens to sales and marketing expenses. Where people showed a significant amount of savings in Q1 and Q2 -- in my mind Q1 and Q2 were extraordinary quarters -- Q3 - almost 90 percent of clinics are open, everybody is back in the field. So the question is how much of these costs are likely to come back? Have there been any structural changes or behavioural changes now that the lockdown has been lifted? In my mind, marketing expenses will come back,” she said.

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(Edited by : Niral Sharma)