Sun Pharma Buys US, Hungarian Drug Plants from Valeant

Sun Pharma (Mumbai, India) has purchased two manufacturing plants from Valeant Pharmaceuticals (Costa Mesa, CA) for undisclosed sums.

On Wednesday, Sun announced it had agreed to buy Valeant's Bryan, Ohio, liquid and semisolid dosage facility. Last month, Valeant sold Sun Pharma a raw-materials and dosage-form manufacturing operation in Hungary.

Valeant is a $680-million specialty pharma company focusing on neurology, dermatology, and infectious disease. The sales, says CEO Timothy C. Tyson, are part of the company's plan to consolidate manufacturing into four facilities by the end of 2006.

Sun Pharma is the 5th-ranked Indian pharmaceutical company, specializing in psychiatry, neurology, cardiology, diabetes, gastroenterology, and orthopedics. Sun bought the plants to expand its generics business on two continents. The Ohio acquisition, said Chairman Dilip Shanghvi, will join Sun's US subsidiary, Caraco Pharmaceutical Laboratories (Detroit, MI), to strengthen Sun's American generics business and give the company capacity in liquid, cream, and ointment formulations. The Hungarian purchase expands capacity in bulk actives and product development, and will speed up product roll-out in Europe.

–Douglas McCormick