World’s largest generic drugmaker Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd said on Wednesday it has agreed to sell assets and operations of Actavis Generics in the UK and Ireland to Intas Pharmaceuticals Ltd, for £603 million ($769 million or Rs 5,117 crore).
This marks the second-biggest overseas acquisition by an Indian pharma company ever. It comes just a year after Lupin Ltd, India's third-largest drugmaker by sales, agreed to acquire US-based pharmaceutical major GAVIS Pharmaceuticals LLC and Novel Laboratories Inc. (together known as GAVIS) for $880 million (Rs 5,610 crore).
Petah Tikva, Israel-headquartered Teva, which is listed on NYSE and Tel Aviv Stock Exchange, said the divestment of the assets and operations was part of an undertaking that it made to the European Commission related to the acquisition of Actavis Generics from Allergan.
The $40.5 billion acquisition of Allergan’s generics business was completed in August.
Teva said the latest transaction with Intas will include a portfolio of generic medicines and a manufacturing plant in Barnstaple, England. Teva retains a number of Actavis non-overlapping generic products as well as certain specialty medicines and OTC (over-the-counter) products, which have been added to Teva’s existing operations.
“The sale has been a success for Teva in that we have satisfied the EU Commission’s sale requirements for these businesses, subject to their final approval, and agreed on a good price for the assets. With the assets that it will retain, Teva will create an even stronger operation in the UK and Ireland,†said Siggi Olafsson, president and CEO of global generic medicines at Teva.
The transaction is expected to close in three months. Greenhill & Co. is serving as financial advisors and Pinsent Masons is serving as legal counsel to Teva in this transaction.
Earlier, The Economic Times had reported citing unnamed persons that Indian drugmakers Aurobindo Pharma and Intas Pharmaceuticals have submitted binding bids to acquire products from Teva in the UK, Iceland and Ireland. While Aurobindo was being advised by Morgan Stanley, Intas is advised by investment bank Moelis, the report had said.
Aurobindo had previously bought some of Teva’s assets. In July, the Federal Trade Commission of the US said Aurobindo would acquire one product from Teva in the US region within 10 days of Teva and Allergan’s merger.
Teva had found 11 buyers for its basket of over 70 products for the US region. The buyers included Indian firms Dr Reddy’s Laboratories, Zydus Cadila, Cipla and Aurobindo Pharma.
In January 2014, Aurobindo acquired the western European business of Actavis and was seen as a strong contender to snap the latest deal.
Privately held Intas that counts Singapore’s state investment firm Temasek as a shareholder had last year acquired a part of Spanish firm Combino Pharm for an undisclosed amount, to strengthen its business in Europe.
In May 2016, Ahmedabad-based Intas Pharma had also struck a domestic deal where RPG Life Sciences Ltd—an integrated pharmaceutical firm operating in the domestic and international markets in the branded formulations, global generics, synthetic and fermentation APIs space—decided to offload its biotech unit to Intas for Rs 25 crore (over $3.7 million).
RPG Life Sciences is part of the Harsh Goenka-led RPG Group.
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