RANBAXY

Company Profile

Ranbaxy Laboratories Limited (Ranbaxy), India's largest pharmaceutical company, is an integrated, research based, international pharmaceutical company, producing a wide range of quality, affordable generic medicines, trusted by healthcare professionals and patients across geographies. Ranbaxy today has a presence in 23 of the top 25 pharmaceutical markets of the world. The Company has a global footprint in 43 countries, world-class manufacturing facilities in 8 countries and serves customers in over 125 countries. 

History

Ranbaxy was started by Ranbir Singh and Gurbax Singh in 1937 as a distributor for a Japanese company Shionogi. The name Ranbaxy is a combination of the names of its first owners Ranbir and Gurbax. Bhai Mohan Singh bought the company in 1952 from his cousins Ranbir and Gurbax. After Bhai Mohan Singh's son Parvinder Singh joined the company in 1967, the company saw an increase in scale.

Mission

Ranbaxy's mission is 'Enriching lives globally, with quality and affordable pharmaceuticals'.

Milestones

Ranbaxy & Co sold over promoter’s debt

Ranbaxy’s original promoters, Ranjit Singh and Gurbax Singh, got together to form Ranbaxy & Co. with the aim of taking up the distribution of medicines in the country on behalf of foreign pharma firms. In the early 1950s, Gurbax Singh sought additional financing and turned to a local moneylender, Bhai Mohan Singh. In due course, Gurbax Singh had built up huge debts to Bhai Mohan Singh. When Bhai Mohan Singh came to collect, Gurbax offered to turn over their company to him instead. Bhai Mohan Singh agreed to the deal and on August 1, 1952, he became promoter of Ranbaxy & Co.

Sleeping pill helps Ranbaxy hit pay dirt

In the 1960s, when the India’s pharmaceutical market was largely dominated by foreign drug makers, Ranbaxy tied-up with an Italian pharmaceutical company Lepetit SpA and began production in 1962. Ranbaxy’s upside came in 1970, when the Government passed legislation that effectively ended patent protection. Ranbaxy struck pay dirt early on, when it launched Calmpose, a generic formulation of the hugely popular Roche drug Valium. Released in 1969, Calmpose immediately placed Ranbaxy on India’s pharma map. The company expanded quickly, and by 1973, Ranbaxy opened a new factory, in Mohali, for the production of active principal ingredients (APIs). This facility enabled the company to expand its range of generic medications and ingredients. To finance its growth, the company listed on the stock exchange that year.

Kicking off global ambitions

Ranbaxy’s ability to produce generic medications at far lower cost than its branded competitors enabled it to expand internationally, especially in less developed markets. It launched a joint venture in Nigeria and opened a production facility in Lagos in 1977. In 1987, the company became India’s leading antibiotic and antibacterial producer when it completed a new plant in Toansa, Punjab. In 1988, the Toansa plant received US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approval and by 1990, the company was granted an US patent for its doxycycline antibiotic preparation. The following year, the company bagged an US patent for its cephalosporin preparations, and the company built a new facility for their production in Mohali. A big milestone for the company was recorded in 1992, when it reached a marketing agreement with Eli Lilly & Co. The companies set up a joint venture in India to produce and market Lilly’s branded pharmaceuticals for the domestic market while Lilly agreed to begin marketing Ranbaxy’s generic medications in the US. Ranbaxy, thereby, gained access into the world’s single largest drugs market.

Boardroom coup ousts Bhai Mohan

In the late 1980s, in a family settlement Bhai Mohan Singh split the businesses between his three sons. The eldest son, and Bhai Mohan Singh’s favourite, Dr Parvinder Singh and his family got control over Ranbaxy. Subsequently, however, the relationship between Bhai Mohan Singh and Dr Singh soured on differences over Ranbaxy’s growth strategy. Dr Singh took over at the helm of the company in 1992, ousting his father in what was seen as a messy family feud. By then, Ranbaxy had grown into one of India’s largest pharmaceutical companies on the basis of its generics production. Under Dr Singh, Ranbaxy adopted a new corporate mission in 1993 to announce its reformulated ambitions: “To become a research-based international company.”

Outsiders step in

Dr Parvinder Singh died in 1999 and his right-hand man Mr D.S. Brar took over as company leader. Mr Brar, on taking over, named family outsider Brian Tempest as company President. The new management team continued Dr Singh’s expansion strategy, opening a new manufacturing plant in Vietnam in 2001. Ranbaxy also sought new alliances, and in 2003 the company reached a global drug discovery and development partnership with GlaxoSmithKline. The company’s international expansion also took a major step forward at the end of 2002, when it agreed to acquire RPG (Aventis) in France. Ranbaxy’s sales had by then topped the $1 billion mark

Family back at the helm

In December 2003, Mr Brar, CEO and Managing Director, announced his decision to resign from his post. Mr Brar was to complete his tenure in July 2004. He named Dr Brian Tempest (President, Pharmaceutical Division, Ranbaxy) as his successor. Mr Brar’s exit from the company was attributed to strained relationships between Ranbaxy’s professional managers and the promoter family. Subsequently, in early 2006, after an interval of seven years, the promoter family re-took control at the helm of Ranbaxy, with Dr Parvinder Singh’s son, Malvinder Singh, donning the mantle of CEO and MD.

Products
Ranbaxy Laboratories Limited manufacture and markets generic pharmaceuticals, value added generic pharmaceuticals, branded generics, active Pharmaceuticals (API) and intermediates.The Company remains focused on ascending the value chain in the marketing of pharmaceutical substances and is determined to bring in increased revenues from dosage forms sales. Ranbaxy's diverse product basket of over 5,000 SKUs available in over 125 countries worldwide, encompasses a wide therapeutic mix covering a majority of the chronic and acute segments. Healthcare trends project that the chronic treatment segments will outpace the acute treatment segments, primarily driven by a growing aging population and dominance of lifestyle diseases. Our robust performance in Cardiovasculars, Central Nervous System, Respiratory, Dermatology, Orthopedics, Nutritionals and Urology segments, clearly indicates that the Company has strengthened its presence in the fast-growing chronic and lifestyle disease segments.

Top 10 Molecules (2010)
• Valacyclovir
• Simvastatin
• Donepezil
• Atorvastatin & Combinations
• Co-amoxyclav & Combinations
• Ciprofloxacin & Combinations
• Ketorolac Tromethamine
• Imipenem+Cilastatin
• Ginseng+Vitamins
• Loratadine & Combinations

Company's Q1 Result ( click here )
click here for Financial Reports


Research and Development
Ranbaxy views its R&D capabilities as a vital component of its business strategy that will provide a sustainable, long-term competitive advantage. The company has a pool of over 1,200 R&D personnel engaged in path-breaking research. Ranbaxy is among the few Indian pharmaceutical companies in India to have started its research program in the late 70's, in support of its global ambitions. A first-of-its-kind world class R&D centre was commissioned in 1994. Today, the company has multi-disciplinary R&D centers at Gurgaon, in India, with dedicated facilities for generics research and innovative research. The R&D environment reflects its commitment to be a leader in the generics space offering value added formulations and development of NDA/ANDAs, based on its Novel Drug Delivery System (NDDS) research capability.

Environment, Health and Safety 

Ranbaxy is fully committed to achieve Environment, Health & Safety (EHS) excellence and conduct its activities in the most responsible manner. Over the years, importance of EHS has been stressed and extensively promoted as a corporate culture within Ranbaxy. It is also clearly reflected and well defined into Ranbaxy’s value statements of “Managing our operations with high concern for safety and environment” and “Be a responsible corporate citizen”. Thinking and working responsibly so that the employees, the community at large, and the environment including the natural resources, are protected leaving minimal environmental footprints, is integral to Ranbaxy’s EHS philosophy. On the road to EHS excellence, Ranbaxy has adopted a top down approach and embraced the principles and codes of best EHS practices into its redefined world class EHS Management System. 

Anti Malaria Project

Ranbaxy has been working on the anti-malaria research project since May 2003. Although antimalarial drugs have a large market, it is a market with very limited resources. Together with the challenges of drug resistance, poor health systems, lack of affordable, safe and convenient treatment options, malaria treatment represents one of the largest unmet medical needs. Ranbaxy has developed a synthetic peroxide antimalarial drug, arterolane maleate + piperaquine phosphate in order to address this unmet need.Based in a malaria endemic country, Ranbaxy deeply identified with the continuing crisis that malaria is causing in developing countries. The company therefore committed its expertise in R&D to work towards a breakthrough in the treatment of this important disease.

Corporate Social Responsibility Corporate Social Commitment and Public Service is deeply embedded into the cultural fabric of Ranbaxy. Over the years serious efforts have been directed towards making a meaningful contribution in uplifting and transforming the lives of the underprivileged. The Company is also extremely conscious of its duty and responsibility towards the environment. We continue to make sincere efforts to promote good health, social development and better environment, through various Company programs that contribute to sustainable, all round growth. In 1978, in the wake of the grim health scenario in India, Ranbaxy realised the urgency to reach out to the underprivileged sections of society that had little or no access to basic healthcare. The Company took a conscious decision to contribute towards the national objective “Health For All”. Towards this end, the “Ranbaxy Rural Development Trust” was set up and the first well equipped mobile healthcare van was introduced, in certain underserved areas of Punjab. As the program grew, the Ranbaxy Community Healthcare Society (RCHS), an independent body, was created. RCHS is devoted to the health of the disadvantaged. Today, 16 well equipped mobile healthcare vans and an urban family welfare centre, run by Ranbaxy, benefit over 5.5 lakh people, in identified areas in the State of Punjab, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh and Delhi. A total of 76 personnel including 26 doctors 30 nurses are devoted full time to the program. The program is based on an integrated approach of preventive, promotive and curative services, spanning areas of maternal child health, family planning, reproductive health, adolescent health, health education including AIDS awareness.