Organization: GlaxoSmithKline Pharmaceuticals Ltd
MD: Mr A Vaidheesh
Bioscience Revenue: Rs 440.33 crore

GSK develops and makes medicines to treat broad range of acute and chronic diseases. GSK India continues to be a leader in many of the therapy areas. The year has witnessed key brands in the mass markets portfolio such as Zinetac, Calpol, Neosporin, Betnesol, Zyloric, Zentel and Cetzine maintain dominant market leadership.

In the vaccine segment, during the fiscal year 2014-15, GSK has acquired GlycoVaxyn AG, a specialist vaccine biopharmaceutical company based in Switzerland, incorporated in 2004. The company is focused on development of next-generation bioconjugate vaccines against bacterial infections, utilizing its versatile and innovative bioconjugation platform.

Since forming a scientific collaboration in 2012, GSK has held a minority stake in GlycoVaxyn and has now acquired the remaining shares for $190 million (approximately £124 million) in cash to take full ownership of the company.

GlycoVaxyn has developed an innovative biological conjugation platform technology which has the potential to play an important role in the development of new prophylactic and therapeutic vaccines for a range of bacterial diseases. This proprietary technology also has the potential to enable GSK to develop a simplified conjugate vaccine manufacturing process. Under the terms of transaction, GSK will additionally acquire a small number of early stage vaccines in development against
bacterial infections such as pneumonia, pseudomonas, staphylococcus aureus and shigellosis, supplementing the company's existing vaccines pipeline.

In April 2014, GSK, London, UK, entered into three interconditional agreements with Novartis AG (Novartis), Basel, Switzerland. In one such agreement GSK agreed to acquire Novartis' vaccines business (excluding influenza vaccine) and manufacturing capabilities and facilities from Novartis, and in the second agreement, GSK agreed to sell the rights of its Marketed Oncology Portfolio, related R&D activities and AKT Inhibitors currently in development to Novartis.

Globally, these transactions with Novartis were completed on March 2, 2015. In connection to the above transactions, GSK Pharma in its board meeting, approved the transactions on an asset sale basis with Novartis Healthcare Pvt Ltd.

Pursuant to the global deal, GSK will have its distribution rights terminated for the oncology portfolio and it will acquire distribution rights for vaccines portfolio. The transaction is expected to be profit neutral for the company.