Glaxo to buy BMS Pakistan for $36.5 million

LONDON: GlaxoSmithKline, the world's second biggest drugmaker, said on Monday it was buying Bristol-Myers Squibb Pakistan for $36.5 million, adding to recent acquisitions made in emerging markets.

In October Glaxo bought Bristol-Myers Squibb Co's Egyptian mature products for $210 million. The deal includes Veslosef, a popular branded antibiotic in Pakistan, along with products in cancer and cardiovascular drugs.

"Although small in size this further highlights the strategy outlined recently by CEO Andrew Witty to increase GSK's presence in the emerging markets, an area where it currently lags its European peers," said Simon Mather, an analyst at WestLB.

"We currently forecast the emerging markets to account for 18 percent of the global market by 2012 and see GSK's move to focus on these rapidly growing countries as positive." New chief executive Andrew Witty has made emerging markets a priority, a pledge backed up in July by a deal with South Africa's Aspen Pharmacare Holdings.

"We are continuing to make investments in emerging markets, to grow and diversify GSK's business," said Abbas Hussain, GSK's president, emerging markets, in a statement on Monday.