Seven drug brands from Iceland's Actavis Group and its Polish affiliate Biovena has been acquired by India’s Glenmark Pharmaceuticals Ltd, enhancing its presence in Europe and lifting its shares. The India company Glenmark announced on Tuesday, July 1 that this deal is expected to boost its sale in the European market by $15 million in the fiscal ending March 2009, but kept from revealing the value of the deal. Anti-depressant Cital and epilepsy drug Lamotrix, included in the products deal, make up for nearly half of the sales for all the seven drugs.

The shares of Glenmark increased by 3.6 per cent to high of 629.95 rupees in a Mumbai market that was up about 1 per cent. Speaking on this acquisition, Glenn Saldanha, Glenmark's MD, said ‘This portfolio acquisition will accelerate our growth in a very promising Central & East European market.’ Saldanha then added, ‘The Polish market has good potential for branded generic products and Glenmark will now have the necessary front-end and the product range to access and develop in this exciting market.’ It was informed that the pharma market of Poland was worth $7.4 billion in 2007 as per the IMS data and that it is growing at about 8 per cent from the year before.