Piramal’s wholly-owned Critical Care subsidiary in the UK has signed an agreement to acquire five anesthesia and pain management injectable products from Janssen Pharmaceutica for $155m, and up to an additional $20m.

As part of the agreement, five injectable versions of Janssen brands, Sublimaze (fentanyl citrate), Sufenta (sufentanil citrate), Rapifen (alfentanil hydrochloride), Dipidolor (piritramide), and Hypnomidate (etomidate) will be acquired.

The acquisition of the brand names and all related IP as associated with the products will enable Piramal to boost growth in the healthcare businesses, organically as well as inorganically.

"Four of the acquired products are controlled substances which have higher barriers to entry."

The company will also have the ability to make both the active pharmaceutical ingredients (API) and the finished dosage forms of the products.

At present, the products are marketed in more than 50 countries.

Piramal chairman Ajay Piramal said: “The healthcare segment has grown at 17% compound annual growth rate (CAGR) over the last five years.

“This acquisition is an important step in enabling Piramal Critical Care to start to address the global generic injectable hospital drug market which is greater than $20bn in size.”

Janssen said it will continue to supply finished dosage forms for up to three years and API for up to five years.

Until the marketing authorisations are transferred to Piramal, Janssen will also continue to sell the products on behalf of Piramal.

Piramal Critical Care CEO Peter DeYoung said: “Four of the acquired products are controlled substances which have higher barriers to entry.

“Once the business is fully transitioned to us, our customers and business partners will benefit from our broader product basket, and in turn we can grow the value of the acquired product portfolio through our team’s focused sales and marketing efforts.”