Drugs giant Novartis pumps up its bet on ‘biosimilars’

Swiss pharmaceutical firms Novartis and Lonza separately deepened their push into so-called biosimilars, betting cheaper copies of name-brand drugs will make headway among cost-conscious governments.

Novartis’s Sandoz generics unit, among the biggest biosimilars makers, has agreed to license from Poland’s Polpharma Biologics, a version of Biogen’s decade-old Tysabri for multiple sclerosis.