GSK Extends Product Portfolio In Middle East, North Africa

Published: 02-Jul-2009

Business comprises a portfolio of 13 branded pharmaceuticals

GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) has acquired the branded generics business of Bristol Myers Squibb in Lebanon, Jordan, Syria, Libya and Yemen for $23.2 million. The business comprises a portfolio of 13 branded pharmaceuticals.

The company said that this is a strategy to accelerate growth in emerging markets and to provide medicines to patients in the Middle East and North Africa.

The acquisition builds upon GSK’s previous purchases of mature branded products in 2008 from Bristol Myers Squibb in Pakistan and Egypt, which included a manufacturing plant in Giza, Greater Cairo. Bristol Myers Squibb will continue to supply the products acquired until 2011, when it is anticipated that manufacture will transfer to GSK’s Giza plant.