Piramal Pharma readies war chest for potential acquisition targets

After raising Rs 3,523 crore by selling 20 per cent equity to Carlyle Group, Piramal Pharma (PPL) is looking actively for potential acquisition targets, along with growing its existing business. It will list the firm after it achieves more scale.

A decade after Piramal sold its domestic formulations business to Abbott Laboratories for $3.72 billion, the group is now looking at re-entering the space in India. In June, it sold 20 per cent stake to Carlyle at an enterprise value of $2.78 billion and said it would use the funds to reduce debt, grow organically, and look for acquisitions. It completed the deal on Tuesday.

Piramal is readying a war chest for future strategic investments — both organic and inorganic. Speaking to Business Standard, Nandini Piramal, executive director of Piramal Enterprises, said it is in the process of making a significant capital investment to ramp up capacities for formulation and active-pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs). “We are making both greenfield and brownfield capital expenditure (capex). We are building both formulation and API blocks for our customers,” she said.

PPL did not share the capex amount, citing the silent period before quarterly results.

PPL now has a contract manufacturing business, a hospital generics business for specialised products over 100 countries, a consumer products division that sells over-the-counter products in India, and a joint venture with Allergan India for opthalmology products.