Cipla management outlines new focus areas for the future

Drugmaker Cipla’s management has reiterated that the 2 per cent-odd stake sale by promoters earlier this year was towards philanthropy and social efforts of the company.

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The recent stake sale was towards the stated objectives “around the area of philanthropy and around the area of social impact,” Cipla Managing Director and Global Chief Executive Umang Vohra said, responding to a query during the company’s annual shareholder meeting, held recently.

“This has happened this year and last year also but the main thing is there is no major disruption from this amount which the promoters are taking for the social efforts for the company,” he added. The statement comes against the backdrop of reports last year that promoters were looking to exit their stake, something that has also been denied by the promoters.

Newer areas

The management also told shareholders on the newer areas it was keen to focus on. This had been recently shared with businessline by Cipla’s Vohra.

In fact, Cipla doyen Dr YK Hamied said in his opening remarks, “we are investing in newer devices and in the area of diagnosis, biotech, stem cells, gene therapy, CART technology and messenger RNA technologies. This, in my opinion is in the immediate future and will benefit the company immensely. Additionally, we are studying advanced methods of treatment expanding both manufacturing, marketing and distribution technologies, using automation and digitalisation to achieve our future goals.”

This would be in addition to their efforts in segments including respiratory medicine, chronic diseases such as HIV, AIDS, and TB and work in the fight against antimicrobial resistance, he said.

Cipla’s Vohra added that the company’s blueprint in five to seven years “is not going to be solely in the area of manufacturing and chemistry as we know it today, but also in the world of biology.”

Echoing Dr Hamied’s plans, he said, “So we would like to imagine Cipla’s core business as being a generic business and the several other businesses that we are investing in as businesses of the future. The businesses of the future solely depend on the performance of the core businesses because the core businesses generate cash, generate resources that we can then use to deploy in the innovation businesses of the future.” Further , he added, “We have identified new areas in the space of obesity, mental health and oncology.”