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Novartis India gets board nod to transfer OTC unit to JV with GSK for $17M

By Anuradha Verma

  • 13 Jan 2015
Novartis India gets board nod to transfer OTC unit to JV with GSK for $17M

Novartis India Ltd, a public listed subsidiary of Germany-based Novartis AG, has obtained its board approval to transfer its over-the-counter (OTC) products division to the consumer healthcare joint venture with GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) Consumer Private Limited, as per the press release.

GSK Consumer Pvt Ltd is a private firm.

The unit will be sold to the JV for Rs 109.7 crore ($17 million) or before October 22, 2015, it said on Tuesday.

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In April last year, Novartis and Swiss drug maker GSK struck a multi-billion-dollar global deal to restructure their businesses.

The deal involved swapping assets and combining their consumer health units. As per the deal, Novartis agreed to buy out GSK's cancer drugs business and sell its vaccines division, excluding the flu unit, to GSK.

The two firms also agreed to form a global consumer healthcare JV in which GSK will own 63.5 per cent stake and Novartis would own the remaining 36.5 per cent holding. GSK would contribute its global consumer health care business to the joint venture.

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Zubair Ahmed was named as head of Asia Pacific, Middle East and Africa for this global joint venture. Ahmed, an FMCG veteran, currently serves as a senior vice president Indian sub-continent (India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh) for GSK Consumer Healthcare and is also the managing director of GlaxoSmithKline Consumer Healthcare Ltd (GSKCH), the consumer products subsidiary of UK-based GlaxoSmithKline Plc.

He continues as chief of GSKCH, one of the two public listed arms of GSK in India.

(Edited by Joby Puthuparampil Johnson)

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