Intra-country tiered pricing: Optimizing pricing strategies in emerging

markets Intra-country tiered pricing (ICTP) is a commercial strategy used by pharmaceutical

companies to charge different prices to different customer segments in the same market.

The objective is to increase access to patients who otherwise won’t be able to afford the

high priced drugs by creating a pricing mechanism which takes into account affordability.

The approach offers opportunities to increase product uptake into previously untapped

income segments, targeting different distribution channels or health financing systems and

insurance coverage schemes.

The scope of the project involved conducting in-depth research to understand the

following:

Is it legally possible to implement such kind of a pricing structure?

How to find affordability levels?

How to involve different stakeholders in the process (industry, payers, doctors and

pharmacies)?

What kind of hurdles will come while implementing such a pricing structure?

How to prevent fraud?

How to track the adherence of medicines distributed under ICTP?

The research also involved understanding different factors that can be taken into account

while establishing affordability, different entities which can be trusted with the

responsibility to establish affordability, the challenges in means testing, the number of

price points and many such related aspects.

The research comprised of both primary as well as secondary research. We had to identify,

and conduct interviews with senior experts from the industry, oncologists in private and

public sector, senior leaders from the pharmacy chains and payers in private and public

space. We also did a thorough web based research on the pricing examples in the target

markets as well as other known cases of intra-country tiered pricing in other markets to

identify best practices. The outcome of the research was compiled in the form of reports

for the target markets.