Nicholas Piramal Recasts Marketing Wing

Nicholas Piramal (NPIL) has formed four strategic business units (SBUs) to streamline its operations to handle a large portfolio of specialised products after the merger of Boehringer Mannheim India Ltd (BMIL) with Piramal Healthcare is approved by the shareholders and the high court.

The expanded 1,200-marketing team is being re-organised into one general and four special teams. The four special teams- are 'extracare' unit to focus on cardiovasculars, 'biotek' to focus on biotechnology products, 'diagnostics' to concentrate on diagnostic products and a separate team to push OTC, (over the counter) products.

One general marketing unit will look after Nicholas' overall operations. The general team will have 600 personnel, 'Extracare' will have 200 plus personnel and others will have around 100 personnel.

 

Jerry Pinto, NPIL chief executive, said, "integration will be the most challenging job in 1997 and we are laying major emphasis on it." Creation of separate profit centres will help the company integrate its acquisitions and avoid lay-offs, he said.

Nicholas previously had a general team to market all the products.

The system worked well in the pre-merger era. However, the system might not work very well now as the company has a larger portfolio.

The restructuring was done in mid-January and the new teams are being put together. A new vice-president, V P Kamath, from Johnson & Johnson, has been appointed to head the new biotek division. And other appointments will be made soon.

The diagnostics range comes from Boehringer Mannheim, the OTC range from Piramal Healthcare and biotech products from Boehringer as well as from its joint venture with Cytran of the United States.

The company has a licensing agreement with Nexstar BM, a Californian firm, to launch 'Ambisome', an anti-fungal drug.

The company will introduce 'Hivid', a new anti-AIDS drug through its biotek division in the third quarter of 1997. Anti-cancer and anti-viral drugs will also be introduced.

NPIL's joint venture with Allergan of US is likely to launch ten eye care products during the year. The company also has another joint venture with Scholl of UK for footcare products.

EGM called

Both Nicholas Piramal India Ltd (NPIL) and Boehringer Mannheim India Ltd (BMIL) will hold their EGMs for obtaining shareholders' approval on February 24. The boards of both companies had earlier passed resolutions approving the merger of BMIL into NPIL on October 31 1996.