LONDON: The German drugs and chemicals company Merck KGaA aims to keep hold its consumers healthcare unit and promising to develop a business to generate $1 billion sale in 2014.
Chief executive of Merck Consumer Health Uta Kemmerich-Keil said we really want to stick to that business, during a media briefing in London highlighting the unit’s strengths. Our plan is a pure growth plan and by the end of this year we will hopefully hit the $1 billion sales mark.
Merck’s other businesses selling prescription drugs, high-tech chemicals and laboratory equipment but has strong brands like Seven Seas vitamins and Bion probiotics.
Further the non-prescription market has seen a wave of consolidation this year and a $17 billion deal for Merck to buy laboratory supplies business Sigma-Aldrich has prompted some bankers to speculate it might consider selling the consumer unit.
In January it also received a boost from the transfer of Neurobion and Floratil, for muscle soreness and diarrhoea, from the prescription drug unit Merck Serono.
