About

The healthcare sector is a particularly demanding sector for in-house lawyers, and global pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) relies on excellent knowledge and expertise from its teams around the world to safeguard the highly complex and regulated products it produces. The GSK Colombia legal team is led by legal affairs manager Carolina Arciniegas Parga, a particularly versatile lawyer who has served GSK for almost four years and has proved successful in a wide range of legal areas. Bringing pharmaceutical and healthcare products to market is a painstaking process that requires careful oversight by legal individuals at all stages of the product life-cycle, and given the multinational nature of GSK’s operations this demands expert cross-border legal expertise also. However, this work is often extremely important for the local communities in which they operate. An excellent example of this is GSK’s recent launch of the anti-AIDS drug Triumeq, a remedy for those afflicted with the disease who have previously not undergone antiretroviral therapy. This is particularly useful for those in lower income areas, and, given that it is thought that 50% of Colombia’s HIV-positive population is undiagnosed, Triumeq assumes even greater importance. In 2016, GSK was the first company to provide this valuable new drug to Colombia, after it was initially trademarked in October 2015. A particularly poignant example of legal work having positive real world-benefits, the GSK legal team’s long hours on this project have proved well worth it.