Wanbury acquires Spain's Cantabria Pharma for Rs 250 cr

New Delhi, Oct 16 (UNI) Wanbury Ltd, the world's largest producer of Metformin, a diabetes control drug, today said it has acquired Spain's Cantabria Pharma for Rs 250 crore, thereby giving it effective entry into the Spanish Generic market growing at 20 per cent.

Cantabria Pharma sees a target of around Rs 200 crore in revenues for the first year, in the ethical formulation segment of the Spanish market with an EBITDA of Euros 8-10 million. Cantabria has product development worth Euros 6 million in the pipeline for the next year, and is expected to grow at a CAGR of 15-20 per cent over a five year period.

''The acquisition of Cantabria Pharma will enable us to enter into the European Generic Markets, where we see good returns in the future. Wanbury is already catering to the European Markets through sale of APIs. We are also looking at bringing Cantabria's products into India,'' Wanbury Corporate Finance Director Ashok Shinkar said.

With this deal, Wanbury shall acquire the Branded Generic Ethical Formulation business of Cantabria, including trademark rights, marketing authorisations and the company's sales and marketing personnel consolidating a revenue of over Rs 180 crore.

The benefits that Wanbury will derive from the acquisition are a strong entry strategy for the rest of European Union (EU), new product developments and increased product introductions in the future, leveraging manufacturing and R&D capabilities of Wanbury, and launch of pure generic drugs in Spain.

The acquisition will be financed by a combination of internal accruals over the period of three years and term loans. Wanbury Limited has set a vision of Rs 1,000 crore market capitalisation by 2009.

Spain-based Cantabria Pharma is the Ethical Pharmaceuticals arm of Industria Farmaceutica Cantabria (IFC), formed as a subsidiary of Andromaco, which was acquired by Gruenthal, Germany in 1993-94.

Since 1997, it has expanded its portfolio to over 17 brands, focused on various therapeutic segments like traumatology, pain management, asthma, anti depressants, anti eplileptics, anti ulcerants, cephalosporins, beta blokers.

Wanbury Ltd is the world's largest producer of Metformin, a diabetes management product with production in excess of 3,000 tonnes. In addition to Metformin, Wanbury boasts of a strong product portfolio which includes Salsalate, Glucosamine, Mefenamic Acid, Tramadol, Amitryiptyline, Promethazine, Sertraline, Carvedilol, Ibuprofen, Gabapantene etc.

Created from the merger of Pearl Organics Ltd and Wander Pvt Ltd, the company exports to over 50 countries addressing the needs of over 200 customers across the globe.

Its production facilities are located at Patalganga, Tanuku and Tarapur and plans are on to expand facilities in all three locations. The company has two R&D centres in Turbhe, Navi Mumbai and Chembur in Mumbai.

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