Pharma in 2014: Deals Worth Billions and Fines Worth Millions


NEW DELHI: It's been a year of bitter medicine for Indian pharma companies with fines worth millions of dollars imposed by various foreign regulators, even as they stitched together deals worth billions of dollars, including the high profile Sun-Ranbaxy merger.

On the other hand, the government sought to put controls on drugmakers when it came to pricing of essential drugs, including those for common cough and cold as also for cancer and other diseases.

Incidentally, home-grown Ranbaxy, founded by the family of Malvinder and Shivinder Mohan Singh, was at the centre of most of the developments for major part of the year, including for M&A deals and regulatory clampdown by foreign regulators, including in the U.S. and Europe.

In a surprise announcement in April, Sun and Ranbaxy -- at that time owned by Japan's Daiichi -- declared an all-stock deal to create India's largest and world's fifth-largest drugmaker in an over USD 4 billion deal.

The deal soon came under the scanner of fair trade watchdog Competition Commission of India (CCI), which ordered the first ever public scrutiny of an M&A deal for this merger, before clearing it towards the end of the year after ordering the divestment of seven brands between two firms.

The deal marked another transition in the ownership for Ranbaxy, in which Japan's Daiichi Sankyo had acquired a majority stake in 2008 for Rs 22,000 crore after the erstwhile promoters Malvinder and Shivinder Singh exited the firm.

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Source: PTI