UAE pharma plans $335mn expansion

(Getty Images)

Gulf Pharmaceutical Industries said it planned to invest 1.23 billion dirhams ($335 million) over three years to push into Asian and Middle Eastern markets and set up an insulin plant in the UAE.

The company, known as Julphar, will set up seven factories in the UAE's Ras Al-Khaimah emirate, where it is based, as part of plans to triple sales to 2.25 billion dirhams by 2010, chief executive Abdul Razzak Yousef said in a statement on Tuesday.

The Ras Al-Khaimah investments will cost 800 million dirhams and will include the company's first biotechnology project to produce human insulin, Julphar said.

The plant, which will cost 260 million dirhams, will produce around 1,500 kilogrammes of human insulin crystals a year to supply about one-third of the demand in the Middle East and North Africa, it said. Human insulin is used to treat diabetes.

Julphar will invest 75 million dirhams in plants in Sudan, Afghanistan, India, Morocco, Iran, Yemen and Lebanon. Each investment will account for about 10% of project cost with local partners coming up with the rest. (Reuters)

Print | Email | Discuss this article

| Share |

MORE FROM ARABIANBUSINESS.COM