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Ranbaxy looks at France, Mexico for overseas growth

Our Bureau

MUMBAI, July 11

RANBAXY Laboratories Ltd has identified France and Mexico as its potential future overseas markets.

Speaking to reporters on the sidelines of an Investors' Meet in Mumbai, Mr D.S. Brar, Managing Director, Ranbaxy Laboratories Ltd, said that ``Ranbaxy will strive to be a truly global and a speciality pharmaceutical company by 2004.''

Ranbaxy will concentrate on six core markets comprising the US, Germany, the UK, China, Brazil and India which will the key growth drivers, henceforth. The company plans to notch up $300 million in the US market alone by 2004.

The company expects other markets outside India to grow by CAGR of over 25 per cent while India to grow at six per cent.

However, Mr Brar said that no infrastructure in terms of manufacturing facilities will be set up in these countries. ``We expect the contributions of overseas markets to the overall turnover to increase significantly. US and India will contribute 65 per cent of global turnover by 2004'', he said.

Ranbaxy Laboratories's forthcoming research focus is to be on the inhalation segment in NDDS (Novel Drug Delivery System) products. The company has four research products in the pipeline in NDDS.

Ranbaxy is also exploring avenues to launch its NDDS product Cifran OD in India. ``We are exploring several options. One option explored is of a three-way co-marketing involving three companies including Ranbaxy.'' Cifran-OD is a once a day dosage form o f antibiotic ciprofloxacin.

The company is to launch two NDDS products in India. ``One dosage form of this NDDS of ciprofloxacin is undergoing international clinical trials under license to Bayer,'' he said.

On Vidhyut Investments, a wholly-owned subsidiary which incurred losses due to the stock market scam, Mr Brar said that of the potential loss of Rs 35 crore, Rs 9.5 crore has already been provided for last year. The rest will be provided for this year.

``Lending on stock market securities has stopped. We will not have any exposure to the stock market henceforth,'' he said.

Ranbaxy's first new chemical entity, RBx2258 is at present undergoing phase two wherein the preliminary tests are encouraging, said Mr Brar. The company will launch the entity in West European markets by 2006 and is looking for alliances to conduct trial s.

Mr Brar said that the company plans to cross $ 600 million in global sales in fiscal year 2001 with research expenditure to go up to six per cent of sales. For the fiscal year 2000, Ranbaxy recorded global sales of $ 507 million.