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Pharmaceuticals deal with Japanese giant

Australian pharmaceutical giant Sigma has signed a $50 million export deal with a $5 billion-a-year, top-10 Japanese pharmaceutical company, Kyowa Hakko Kogyo.

At a signing ceremony and cherry blossom tree planting at Sigma’s South Croydon campus on behalf of Health Minister Rob Knowles, Parliamentary Secretary for Health Robert Doyle said the deal for oral-dose penicillin products is a significant contribution to Victoria’s pharmaceutical industry.

Sigma is Australia’s second-largest antibiotics manufacturer with a yearly turnover of $1.2 billion.

Sigma’s agreement with Kyowa Hakko Kogyo, which employs 5000 people worldwide, evolved from a meeting facilitated by Sumitomo Corporation, one of Japan’s top three trading companies.

The initial seven-year contract with three-year extensions follows 21 months of planning and site visits in Japan and Australia. The first shipment of penicillin products to Japan is scheduled for July 2000.

Kyowa Hakko Kogyo’s manufacturing plant in Japan will be decommissioned and its specialist equipment shipped to Australia and reassembled at the South Croydon facility.

"Through this contract, Sigma will be able to expand its antibiotic manufacturing facility and increase its penicillin output as a regional supplier, Mr Doyle said.

(News Release, Office of the Parliamentary Secretary for Health, September 6, 1999)