Takeda Chemical Industries Ltd.: Lessons from a Japanese Pharma Major

In 1997, the company established Takeda UK Limited as a wholly owned pharmaceutical marketing subsidiary and launched Blopress (used in treating hypertensive patients) in the UK market. In the same year, Takeda also established Takeda Ireland Ltd., a manufacturing plant in Ireland and Takeda America Holdings, Inc, a holding company in US.

However, TAP remained the primary source of profits for the company in the US. TAP, responsible for marketing Lupron and Pervacid, helped in generating sales revenues of $755 million and $1.56 billion respectively for Takeda in 1998. In 1998, Takeda opened Laboratories Takeda, a wholly-owned subsidiary in France and established Takeda Pharmaceuticals America, Inc, a wholly-owned pharmaceutical marketing company in the US...

Though Takeda's globalization drive had picked up momentum in the late 1990s, a major part of its growth still came from domestic sales. The company's success during this period in Japan can be attributed to Actos. In 1999, the drug generated sales of $119 million. Apart from the new products, three of the existing products also contributed greatly to the revenue growth.

These three drugs were Takepron/Pervacid (both used in treating peptic ulcers), Blopress and Leuplin (Refer Table II for sales figures of the top five drugs as compared to the rest of products). To sustain this growth, the company invested heavily in new business development in Japan. Investments in this area increased to $2.81 billion in 1999 from $2.45 billion in 1998, up 14.5%...