India's Biocon raises $129 million from Kotak to fund biosimilars deal

The asset management arm of India's Kotak Mahindra Group said it will invest 10.70 billion rupees ($129 million) in Biocon Ltd to help it fund its acquisition of Viatris Inc's biosimilars business. In late November, Biocon Biologics completed the $3.34 billion acquisition of Viatris' biosimilars business in the United States. To fund the transaction, the company said it paid $2 billion in cash to Viatris and issued $1 billion in convertible preference shares.

Biocon sold a nearly 10% stake in its unit and contract research firm Syngene International Ltd earlier this month, raising 22.5 billion rupees to help fund the deal. Kotak Investment Advisors Ltd (KIAL) has made another investment to help pay for the transaction. "This investment in Biocon comes at a critical juncture in Biocon's forward integration of its biosimilars business," said Srini Sriniwasan, managing director at KIAL.

The Kotak Special Situation Fund, an alternative investment fund managed by KIAL, has fully committed its $1 billion corpus with this investment, according to the company. $1 equals 82.8950 Indian rupees. Biocon Limited is India's largest and fully-integrated innovation-led biopharmaceutical company. The Company is engaged in the manufacture of biotechnology products and research services. Biocon Limited was incorporated in the year 1978 as a joint venture between Biocon Biochemicals Limited of Ireland and an Indian entrepreneur Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw. Biocon manufactured and exported enzymes to USA and Europe during the year 1979 as first of its kind. In 1989 Unilever plc acquired the Biocon Biochemicals Limited in Ireland and merges it with its subsidiary Quest International.