"We have around $100 million in our books, which we had raised through foreign currency convertible bonds (FCCB). The acquisitions will be funded through this fund. We can also raise some money through internal accruals," finance director R Sankariah told the website.
He added that the company wants to be a drug discovery and development service provider as well as an outsourcing partner for major global drug manufacturers. He then went on to say the company already had various proposals but had "to see which is the right fit for the company" although he wouldn't be drawn on a timeline for the acquisitions.
Jubilant is no stranger to acquisitions and has used them in the past to enter both new business sectors and new markets. Indeed, it has already established a CRO foothold in the US but this will be its first foray into the European clinical research market.
Its business is divided into three main segments: Pharmaceuticals and Life Science Products; Industrial Products; and Performance Polymers.
The first of those is then divided into four sub-segments, of which Custom Research and Manufacturing Services (CRAMS) brings in the most revenue.In April of this year, it spent $122.5m on Hollister-Stier Laboratories in what was one of the largest overseas acquisitions by an Indian company in the CRAMS sector. Hollister-Stier, based in Washington state, US, specialised in the manufacturing of sterile injectable vials and lyophilisation products, and is also one of the world's top manufacturers of allergenic extracts.
The Indian CRAMS market is a buoyant one estimated to have generated $895m last year, and expected to reach $6.6bn by 2013, according to data from Frost & Sullivan.
The others are Active Pharmaceuticals Ingredients (APIs), Dosage Forms and Food polymers.
The Indian firm first started its dosage business by buying a majority stake in Belgian firm Pharmaceutical Services Incorporated (PSI), which provides regulatory affairs services and dosage forms to generic pharma firms. Since then, it has also penetrated the US market through its generic pharma subsidiary Cadista Pharmaceuticals (formerly Trigen Laboratories). It also has a Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved manufacturing facility for solid dosage forms.
On top of all this, the company has several subsidiaries that make up its Drug Discovery and Development services business, including the aforementioned US CRO called Clinsys Clinical Research, which is headquartered in New Jersey.
Jubilant Biosys and Jubilant Chemsys deal with discovery informatics and research plus development services.
The report in the Economic Times said the firm were looking to spend between $5m and $10m on a European CRO but how much other acquisitions would cost, and therefore how many they plan to make in total is, as yet, unclear. The firm was unavailable for comment at the time of going to press.