History
Sun Pharmaceutical Industries was established in 1983 by Dilip Shanghvi in Calcutta, now Kolkata, with five products for psychiatry and a marketing team of two people. The company listed on the stock exchange in 1994 in an issue that was oversubscribed 55 times, and the founding family has continued to hold a majority stake.[1]
The 1990s were spent buying capacity and brands. In 1996 it bought a bulk drug plant at Ahmednagar from Knoll Pharmaceuticals, along with plants from Gujarat Lyka Organics and MJ Pharma, and in 1997 it added Tamil Nadu Dadha Pharmaceuticals. Also in 1997 it made its first move abroad by acquiring Caraco Pharmaceutical Laboratories of Detroit.[1]
In 1998 Sun Pharma acquired a group of respiratory brands from Natco Pharma. A string of smaller purchases followed: Melmet Labs in 1999, Pradeep Drug Company in 2000, Phlox Pharma in 2004, formulation plants in the United States and Hungary from Valeant Pharma and Able Laboratories in 2005, and Chattem Chemicals in 2008.[1]
The single most important deal of that period came in 2010, when Sun Pharma took a controlling stake in Taro Pharmaceutical Industries, an Israeli company that ranks among the largest generic dermatology businesses in the United States and also operates in Canada and Israel. In 2012 it announced two American purchases, DUSA Pharmaceuticals, a dermatology device company, and the generics business of URL Pharma.[1][4]
2014 was the year the company changed scale. It signed a licensing agreement with Merck and Co for tildrakizumab, a treatment for chronic plaque psoriasis, and bought Pharmalucence in the United States to obtain sterile injectable manufacturing capacity. In April 2014 it announced the acquisition of Ranbaxy Laboratories in a transaction worth about 4 billion dollars, creating what was then the world's fifth largest specialty generic pharmaceutical company by sales. The Competition Commission of India approved the bid but ordered the two firms to divest seven products to protect competition.[1][6][7]
In March 2015 Sun Pharma agreed to buy the Australian opiates business of GlaxoSmithKline. In 2016 it acquired 14 prescription brands from Novartis in Japan to enter that market, bought Ocular Technologies to strengthen its branded eye care portfolio, and acquired Biosintez to build a position in Russia.[1][8] It launched its first branded ophthalmic product in the United States, BromSite, the same year, followed by the specialty drug Odomzo in 2017 and Ilumya in 2018.[1][5]
In 2019 Sun Pharma acquired Pola Pharma in Japan to strengthen its global dermatology business, entered Greater China through a partnership with China Medical System Holdings, and launched Cequa in the United States for dry eye disease.[1][11] In 2023 it acquired Concert Pharmaceuticals, a late stage American biotechnology company, and a 60 per cent stake in Vivaldis Animal Health and Foods.[1][9]
In January 2024 Sun Pharma moved to acquire the remaining stake in Taro Pharmaceutical Industries in a merger valued at about 347.73 million dollars, taking full ownership of the dermatology business it had controlled since 2010. In March 2025 it was announced that the company had acquired Checkpoint Therapeutics, an immunotherapy and targeted oncology company based in Waltham, Massachusetts, for about 355 million dollars.[1]
In April 2026 Sun Pharma agreed to acquire the American healthcare company Organon and Co for about 11.75 billion dollars, its largest purchase to date and one that would push it further into women's health and branded medicines. The announcement lifted the company's shares by more than 9 per cent.[12][13][14]
