The Poonawalla family owned Serum Institute of India Private Limited (SII) is set to become the largest injectable polio vaccine maker in the world by 2020. The company is already the world’s largest oral vaccine maker by number of doses produced and sold.
The company has acquired "the Czech arm of US based firm Nanotherapeutics for 72 million euros (around Rs 500 crore),” according to a press release posted on the company’s website. The company plans to invest another 40 million euros (about Rs 280 crores) to upgrade Nanotherapeutics’ manufacturing plant over the next two years.
The acquisition will help increase production capacity of polio vaccines four-fold to more than 200 million doses by the end of this decade. According to Adar Poonawalla (pictured), chief executive officer of SII, "while there is a requirement of 300 million doses each year globally, the production capacity stands at 100 million only and we will be able to bridge the gap.”
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