Housed at the Salo IoT Campus is possibly the world’s smallest veterinary pharmaceutical company, Vetcare, which has successfully developed medicines from scratch and brought it to market.
The company was founded about thirty years ago by three vets, Kalevi Heinonen, Tuomas Kärkkäinen, and Jukka Kuussaari, as an importer of veterinary medicines. Their colleagues – and animals – had a need for medicines which had no distributor in Finland.
The business expanded into drug development when they started making a profit. The founding trio pondered whether they could start developing medicines themselves.
– All the company founders have always had a strong ethos of development, says Olli Kuussaari, Vetcare’s current CEO.
Today, the company has completed the development of several smaller products and three larger projects, one of which, a probiotic-type feed product, has been on the market for some time. In 2022, Zenalpha, a novel, innovative animal sedative that does not put strain on the hearts of unwell and elderly dogs, in particular, was launched in the United States.
Does your company need support with research collaboration, product development, or commercialization? Business Turku’s experts will help you get on the right track.
Mainly self-funded development
This year, another of Vetcare’s medicines was granted a marketing authorisation. This is rare and not always a given. Drug development processes can be very long, even 15 years, and they always require significant investment.
For Zenalpha, which was completed just before the pandemic, the risks threatened to materialise due to the pandemic, according to Kuussaari. At that time, the US authorities focused solely on medicines intended for humans, which meant Vetcare’s product got stuck in the approval process.
Eventually, the wait lasted two years, and the drug was launched in 2022.
– When a company does product development mainly using its own cash, and nearly all the profit has been invested in development work for many years, everything grinding to a halt is a moment that brings a cold sweat to your brow.What seemed like a routine process suddenly turned into something nerve-racking, says Kuussaari.
That is why Vetcare is considering changing its operating model in the future.
– We are no longer primarily aiming to make the medicines entirely on our own, from start to finish, says Kuussaari. “The goal is to grow our product portfolio to include as many as 15 drug candidates, some of which we will develop to the proof-of-concept stage, after which we may sell some and develop some to completion ourselves.”
The company’s medicines are created in collaboration with the universities of Helsinki and Turku and numerous European higher education institutions.
Veterinary drug development project management
Vetcare does not have its own production facilities or laboratories. Instead, it specialises in veterinary drug development project management. Over the years, it has accumulated expertise, particularly in getting an idea off the ground and turning dreams into reality.
This is where Kuussaari sees the company’s future.
– There’s no point in a small player maintaining a huge army of researchers, says Kuussaari.
– The company’s medicines are created in collaboration with the universities of Helsinki and Turku and numerous European higher education institutions.
This operating model has made the company a particularly efficient drug developer.
– Yes, this is our niche. Our way of working enables us to develop medicines efficiently – and cost-efficiently.
Kuussaari believes that the project management concept even has potential for export.
– We feel that we are still in the early stages of conceptualization, and we want to develop our R&D and project management model even further. Although the sector is conservative, there is investment potential here. It would appear that there is strong demand for our concept.
Fast-growing markets
Ideas for Vetcare’s new medicines often arise from everyday needs.
– Some drug candidates have emerged simply because an individual vet might have said that a certain medicine could be good. We then consider the viability and commercial potential of the idea, Kuussaari explains.
Human medicines also have potential, as some might be usable for animals, too. It may also be possible to expand the use of a drug developed for a particular animal species to other animal species.
This creative generation of ideas has been possible thanks to the company’s close network, operating across the pharmaceutical industry. Being involved in the different stages of the value chain accumulates a vast amount of data.
– That helps in development projects, says Kuussaari.
– However, investing in our project management model means collecting ideas more professionally and efficiently than before, if we are to grow our project portfolio.
There is a gap in the market, as the veterinary medicine market is expected to grow to as much as €90 billion by 2034.
In its drug development, the company focuses on small-scale medicines that generate €10–30 million in annual sales. The large players in the veterinary pharmaceutical industry, with their big in-house R&D units, focus on larger-scale products that generate hundreds of millions over their lifecycles.
– These big players tend to operate in a somewhat rigid manner, Kuussaari suggests.
– As an innovative family business from Salo, we can do our work much more efficiently using outsourcing opportunities. We feel that there are still many diseases in animals that are not treated and for which there are no good medicines. It is our responsibility to be involved in developing these.
Text: Katja Hautoniemi
Photos: Jarno Hiltunen
Business Turku: Lotta Kujanpää, Pia Lappalainen
This article is part of the TKI-kompassi project, funded by the Regional Council of Southwest Finland.
