India has long believed that health is a global responsibility. During the pandemic, India gave meaning to that idea through Vaccine Maitri, supplying vaccines and medicines to countries across the world. That experience strengthened India’s identity as a reliable health partner. Today, India is known as the Pharmacy of the World, a responsibility earned through performance.
The Indian pharmaceutical sector is a strategic sector, having grown over the last 12 years from about US$ 20 billion to US$ 60 billion, while ensuring uninterrupted supplies through the pandemic and the recent West Asia crisis in the spirit of Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam: the world is one family.
Pharmaceutical exports have grown from US$ 14 billion in FY 2015 to US$ 31 billion in FY 2026, a compound annual growth rate of 7.22 percent. India is the third-largest producer of pharmaceuticals by volume, supplies around 20 percent of global generics demand, and reaches more than 200 countries.
The United States remains India’s largest pharmaceutical market. By India’s export data, shipments stand at about US$ 10.5 billion, more than two-and-a-half times the level of 2014. By US import data, Indian supplies are estimated at nearly US$ 15 billion, almost three times in the same period.
India’s pharma story is broad-based. Over the last 12 years, exports to France have grown 3.8 times, Brazil 3.1 times, the United Kingdom 1.7 times, and South Africa 1.6 times. The India-EFTA agreement, backed by US$ 100 billion in investment over 15 years, opens new possibilities in life sciences.
The world seeks quality, continuity, and affordability in healthcare supply chains. India offers all three.
This is why Indian pharma is also a development partnership. It carries the spirit of Vishwa Mitra: India as a friend to the world.
India’s pharma exports by fiscal year, from DGCIS trade data. The colours mark policy eras: pre-GST (when growth was nearly flat), post-GST (when it accelerated), and the PLI era (when company investment and global demand pushed it further).
Eight milestones, each targeting a different barrier. For each one, we asked: did the numbers actually move? Below is what the data shows, and where it doesn’t.
Cumulative FDI equity in Drugs & Pharmaceuticals: $24.8 billion (8th-largest sector at 3.2% of total inflows), per DPIIT Q3 FY 2025–26.
1,043 FDA-registered manufacturing sites in India, concentrated in Telangana (230), Gujarat (181), Maharashtra (139), Andhra Pradesh (115), and Karnataka (76). This infrastructure was built over decades, but the investment signal accelerated it.
Pre-GST (FY 2015–17): Pharma exports were flat at $15.5B to $15.6B, essentially zero growth over two years (0.4% CAGR).
Post-GST (FY 2017–19): Exports accelerated to $19.1B, a 10.6% annual growth rate and the sharpest two-year acceleration in the decade.
Correlation is not proof of cause, but the timing is striking: the single largest break in the export curve falls precisely at the GST transition.
Laurus Labs (API and CDMO specialist): Revenue surged from $340M (FY 2020) to $578M (FY 2021), 70% year-on-year growth, then to $666M by FY 2025. The company expanded from six to twelve manufacturing facilities.
Sun Pharma grew from $4.0B (FY 2021) to $6.2B (FY 2025). Cipla from $2.1B to $3.3B. Biocon from $883M to $1.95B.
FY 2020–21 coincided with peak global pandemic-era pharma demand. The export surge reflects both PLI-driven capacity expansion and COVID-era supply needs. Disentangling the two effects precisely will require several more years of post-pandemic data.
India’s bulk drug imports were $2.9B in FY 2015 and $4.6B in FY 2026. Domestic bulk drug exports grew from $2.9B to $4.9B over the same period.
Both imports and exports grew proportionally over this period. Most bulk drug parks are still under construction, and their effect on the import-to-export ratio will take several more years to appear in the aggregate numbers.
India’s pharma exports to Switzerland rose from $111M (FY 2024) to $144M (FY 2025). Exports to Norway went from $2.6M to $10.6M, and to Iceland from $1.2M to $5.5M over the same period. Monthly data for the first post-TEPA quarter (October–December 2025) shows steady but not yet elevated flows relative to the preceding months.
TEPA has been in force for less than six months of reported trade data. Its structural impact on the pharma corridor will become measurable from FY 2027 onwards.
India’s pharma exports to the UK: $778M (FY 2024) → $914M (FY 2025) → $903M (FY 2026).
UK pharma imports from India: $550M (2022) → $669M (2023) → $774M (2024) → $832M (2025). That is a 51% increase in three years.
India’s competitors in the UK market (2024): US ($4.6B), Germany ($3.2B), Switzerland ($2.1B), France ($1.5B), India ($774M). India is the only major supplier from outside Europe and North America.
Patent filings have risen from 7,382 in 2014 to 16,156 in 2024. Indian science, industry and regulation are gaining maturity together.
Fifteen global pharma multinationals now run Global Capability Centres in India, with more than 30,000 employees and over US$ 300 million in investment. These centres support analytics, clinical operations, regulatory science, pharmacovigilance, digital health, and research.
Regulation protects patients, builds trust, and sustains quality. It must also be predictable, transparent, science-based, and proportionate. When approvals are duplicated without reason and timelines become uncertain, regulation becomes an entry barrier.
Market access for medicines is health diplomacy. Regulatory cooperation is economic diplomacy. Trust between regulators is a strategic partnership.
India filed 7,158 pharma patent applications in 2014. By 2024, that number reached 18,668, a 2.6-fold increase in a decade. The sharpest acceleration came after 2020, when filings surged from 6,166 to over 18,000 in four years.
This matters because it signals a shift: India is not only making medicines invented elsewhere, but increasingly creating new compounds, formulations, and processes of its own.
Policies do not export medicines. Companies do. Revenue data from 410 company annual reports shows how India’s largest pharma firms grew over the reform decade. These are self-reported figures from each company’s published financial statements.
India’s goal is to achieve US$ 50 billion in pharma exports by 2030. To reach it, India must strengthen quality, build API and Key Starting Material resilience, move into higher-value products, become a preferred contract manufacturing hub and clinical research destination, and use trade agreements to remove barriers.
The 38 trade agreements India has signed can open new doors for Indian pharmaceutical exports. In Oman and New Zealand, there is fast-track market entry for Indian medicines.
Even during the West Asia crisis, the Government of India acted with speed and coordination to keep pharmaceutical supply chains running.
The Emergency Credit Line Guarantee Scheme 5.0 supported working capital and supply-chain continuity. The Resilience and Logistics Intervention for Export Facilitation supported exporters facing higher freight and insurance costs. Commercial liquefied petroleum gas was prioritised for pharma. Critical C3-C4 molecules, including propylene and butylene, were allocated from the LPG pool. Maritime coordination ensured shipping services and port operations remained stable.
India’s overall business environment also improved during this period. The World Bank’s Doing Business rank moved from 142nd (2014) to 63rd (2019), a jump of 79 places in five years, driven by GST, the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, and dozens of other reforms. But that was the economy-wide story. The pharma-specific evidence above is what makes the case for medicine: the export curve, the company growth, the patent filings.