The largest active pharmaceutical ingredient (API) manufacturing company of the world, the Alpharma has recently announced that it has reached the final stages of forming a joint venture (JV) company with the SMS Pharmaceuticals. The company officials have informed that Alpharma is planning to set up manufacturing facilities in India by teaming up with the Hyderabad-based company and it will also manufacture cancer drugs at the initial period. The sources from the industry are informing that the SMS Pharmaceuticals is an upcoming API and drug intermediate manufacturer and it was listed in the Bombay Stock Exchange in the month of February, last year.
While talking about their plans further, a top official from the Denmark-based Alpharma said that they are now thinking of investing an amount of over $ 50 million (Rs 200 crore) in the first phase of the manufacturing project. The official added that the JV will also help the SMS to begin manufacturing the finished drug formulations through the utilization of the global marketing skills and infrastructure of Alpharma.
The Director And Corporate Advisor of the SMS Pharmaceuticals, Mr. A P Rao was contacted and requested to make some comments on the issue and said, "We are in discussions with 2-3 global players to expand business and to enter into manufacturing of formulations. Talks with Alpharma are in advanced stages, but so far we have not finalised any deals". However, the sources related to the development have informed that there is possibility for the deal to be signed within the next two to three weeks.
The sources from the Indian pharmaceuticals industry have stated that the Alpharma is a century-old company and it is currently having five huge manufacturing facilities in the places like Oslo (Norway), Copenhagen (Denmark), Budapest (Hungary), Taiwan and China. The company usually manufactures about 14 APIs and it also supplies the products to almost all the leading drug makers across the world. The company earned a huge amount of $168 million by selling its APIs alone in the year of 2006.
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| Posted : 1/16/2008 |
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