Watson buys women’s health company Uteron

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Watson buys women’s health company Uteron

Generics/News | Posted 08/02/2013 0 Post your comment

Generics giant Watson Pharmaceuticals, now known as Actavis, announced on 23 January 2013 that it has completed the acquisition of Belgium-based Uteron Pharma for US$150 million in cash up front, and up to US$155 million in potential future milestone payments.

The acquisition strengthens Watson’s pipeline of originator drugs, with the deal giving Watson access to two potential near term global commercial opportunities in contraception and infertility and one novel oral contraceptive, projected to launch globally in 2018.

Watson is not the only generics company adding originator products to their portfolio. Teva Pharmaceutical Industries has already been taking a lead in this area for some time now, making deals and acquisitions for originator products to compliment their generics range.

The acquisition capitalizes on the growing potential of Watson’s global Women’s Health Brand franchise following its acquisition of Switzerland-based Actavis. The deal is expected to ‘enhance Watson’s brand-name opportunities globally, while also creating near term revenue’.

Uteron’s executive team including Co-CEO and Co-Founder Mr Stijn Van Rompay and CSO and Co-Founder Professor Jean-Michel Foidart, will continue to manage Uteron. Mr Van Rompay had to say of the deal that ‘joining forces with Watson provides an excellent opportunity to advance our product portfolio further and leverage the global commercial platform of Watson’. He added that ‘Uteron Pharma has developed a strong pipeline of innovative products in different stages of development in the area of women's health, based on strong in-house research capabilities combined with deep partnerships with other scientific-led groups, such as Pantarhei Bioscience, which initiated and co-developed Estelle, one of our pipeline products.’

Mr Fred Wilkinson, President of Watson Global Brands and Biosimilars commented that the acquisition represented ‘a solid pipeline, sound development expertise, and sufficient manufacturing capacity to generate value for shareholders within the next two years, and provide the potential of multiple global product introductions through the latter half of the decade.’

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Source: Watson