Ensuring a Bright Future for People
in Asia through Eye Health

Santen’s Asian Business has achieved significant growth over the past 20 years.

Since the 2010s, Santen has expanded its business in South Korea while establishing local subsidiaries and strengthening our in-house sales and business management system in Southeast Asia. Sales have increased approximately 10-fold over the past 10 years, growing to 28.7 billion yen in FY2023 to account for 9% of Santen’s total revenue.  The Asia Business boasts a compound annual growth rate of approximately 20% over the last three years, and also maintains the No. 1 share (*1) of the ophthalmic pharmaceutical market in its core Asian markets.

In this edition, we introduce Santen’s growth to date and its medium- to long-term goals for Asia, where region and country has its own diverse issues and needs, and describe how the team is contributing to the eye health of patients.

Each country and region in Asia has different regulations and healthcare systems, and the challenges faced by ophthalmology professionals and the needs of patients vary from market to market.

For example, while South Korea and Singapore have well-developed medical infrastructure accessible nationwide, the standard of medical care in Thailand and Vietnam and other Southeast Asian countries is different in urban and rural areas, and a shortage of ophthalmologists, laboratory technicians, and other medical personnel often prevents patients from being able to receive proper treatment. In terms of market composition by disease area, the situation varies by country and region: in South Korea, dry eye accounts for an overwhelmingly high 40% of the market; in Thailand, glaucoma and dry eye have equally high composition; and in Vietnam, anti-infectives has the highest composition after dry eye.

To date, Santen Asia has achieved strong sales growth through seamless cross-functional collaboration and by maximizing the value of our products for patient treatment and eye care based on a strategy that responds to the needs of each country and region.

Tomoyuki Yoshida, who was appointed Head of Asia Business in April 2024, had the following to say about further development of the Asia business:

Yoshida joined Santen as a new graduate and worked as an MR in Japan for three years. The knowledge and way of thinking he was exposed to has been very useful in building trust with medical professionals and the local ophthalmology community in the Asia Business, which is in its start-up and growth phase.

He explained that particular importance is being placed on the concept of the “Triple Win” for patients, eye care professionals, and Santen, which involves solving problems in the ophthalmology field and contributing to patients while at the same time driving the growth of our business. “With the aim of achieving all of these goals, we have been working with the leaders of each organization in our Asian business to carefully examine our activities, identify the issues we should prioritize and the initiatives we should focus on, and then refine our activities. In the process, members have begun to recognize the significance of Santen’s responsibility as it concerns ophthalmology in Asia, and discussions have intensified on ‘how we can leverage our activities’ to create more impactful outcomes,” he said.

“I believe that the concept of ‘Triple Win’ and our desire to contribute to patients are the very essence of Santen and make our activities unique to Santen, differentiating us from other companies.

In the past, when I learned that Vietnamese ophthalmologists were having problems treating their patients, I co-worked with local ophthalmology societies to promote learning opportunities among ophthalmologists and worked with the Japan Business to support skill transfers from Japanese ophthalmologists. Ophthalmologists in the region were really impressed that a pharmaceutical manufacturer was willing to help them solve their problems—one ophthalmologist even cried tears of joy. I’m convinced that these efforts played a role in earning their unwavering trust.”

Yoshida had the following to say about his expectations for human resource development and the strengthening of organizational capabilities:

Yoshida, who is enthusiastic about the opportunity, said: “We hope to realize better ophthalmic care in Asia by leveraging the knowledge and strengths accumulated by Santen as the result of its long-standing commitment to ophthalmology, and by working together as one Asia team to build a ‘Triple Win’ situation that meets regional needs.”