Competition watchdog seeks public comments on Sun-Ranbaxy deal

The Competition Commission of India (CCI) Thursday invited comments from all stakeholders, including the general public, on the merger of pharma companies Ranbaxy Laboratories and Sun Pharmaceutical Industries, signalling the first public scrutiny of a merger and acquisition (M&A) agreement in the country.

The comments need to be submitted to the CCI within 15 days, along with supporting documents on how the merger can adversely impact the concerned person or entity, the corporate affairs ministry said in a release here.

"The Commission formed a prima facie opinion that the combination is likely to have an appreciable adverse effect on competition," it added.

Sun Pharma and Ranbaxy, which had announced a $4 billion deal in April, have been asked to make public details of their proposed transaction in a "prescribed format", which has been now put in public domain for "comments/objections/suggestions" from any person adversely affected or likely to be affected by the combination.

The deal would create the largest pharmaceutical company in India and the fifth largest speciality generics company in the world.

CCI chairman Ashok Chawla had said last week that the major issue in the deal is whether the combination would result in high market concentration of certain molecules.

"The major issues obviously are that in many of the molecules, the basic building block in the pharmaceutical industry, whether in some of those molecules there is high market concentration which will emerge as a result (of the merger)," Chawla said.