Lupin director (international business development) Vinita Gupta told The Financial Express that the deal would translate into the largest asset acquisition by an Indian drug company in the US, and will significantly enhance Lupin's generic market reach there.

The acquisition is expected to see Lupin play a more dominant role in the $10-billion cephalosporins market, 65 per cent of which lies in the US and Europe. The deal, understood to be well into the due-dilligence stage, is expected to eclipse several Indian acquisitions in the US including Ranbaxy Lab's $18-million acquisition of Ohm Laboratories, Wockhardt's takeover of Accumed and Sun Pharma's $7.5-million acquisition of Caraco.

Though Lupin's top management did not divulge the details of the acquisition,including the mode of funding, the deal is expected to strategically complement the company's efforts to control the entire value-added chain of intermediates to bulk-to-dosage forms in the global cephalosporins market. Besides, it is expected to "synergise Lupin's domestic strength."

Gupta said that Lupin was already set to cash in on the first generic wave for injectible cefotaxime when the drug goes off patent in August 1998. Cefotaxime is a third generation cephalosporin, one of the larger product groups in the antibiotics segment. The patent for the product is held by German multinational, Hoechst Marion Roussel.

Lupin chairman and managing director DB Gupta said the company was targetting a 10 per cent share (in volume terms) of the global $450-million cefotaxime market within the first year, given that the technical sophistication of this product was unlikely to attract low-technology based companies. International prices of cefotaxime range between $8.5-$9 per one gram vial against a correspondingdomestic price of around $1.

Lupin's cefotaxime bulk plant at Mandideep in Madhya Pradesh has been recommended for the US FDA approval and would probably make it the first Asia company to get this clearance for a sterile bulk-drug unit. The company already has US FDA approval for bulk cephalexin and cefaclor.

The company is also gearing up for a share of the generics global pie for ceftriaxone and ceftazidime.