Alvogen
 | |
| Company type | private |
|---|---|
| Founded | 2009 |
| Founder | Róbert Wessman |
| Headquarters | Pine Brook, New Jersey[1] |
| Revenue |  $1.1 billion (2017) |
| Owners | CVC Capital Partners and Temasek Holdings |
Number of employees | 2800 |
| Website | www |
Alvogen is a private, US-based pharmaceuticals company founded in 2009. Since 2015, it has been majority-owned by CVC Capital Partners and Temasek Holdings.[2] Alvogen focuses on so-called 'difficult-to-make' generic drugs and injectables, and both produces its own products and markets the products of brand name pharmaceutical companies.[3]
History
[edit]Alvogen was founded by Icelandic entrepreneur Róbert Wessman, who stepped down from his position as CEO of another generics company, Actavis, in order to found the company.[4][5]
The first and still a central component of Alvogen is the 130-year old Norwich Pharmaceuticals, which was acquired by Wessman and his investors as a large-scale and certified manufacturing facility. From the early- to mid-2010s, Alvogen expanded rapidly through acquisitions.[6] In Central and Eastern Europe it acquired companies and portfolios including Labormed in Romania.[7][8] In East Asia, it acquired South Korea firms Kunwha[9] and DreamPharma,[10] and then operated them under the umbrella of Lotus Pharmaceuticals, a Taiwan company it purchased in 2014 and which is listed on the Taipei Stock Exchange (1795.TT).[11] In 2016, Alvogen expanded its US footprint with the acquisition of County Line Pharmaceuticals.[12] The history of the growth of Alvogen is the subject of a Harvard Business School case study published in 2018.[13]
In 2017, Alvogen was valued at $4 billion and had 2800 employees spread over thirty-five countries.[14] Beginning in 2019, the company began to spin off its international operations and divisions, some of which had grown large enough to become standalone companies, and to focus on its US operations. Alvogen's Central and Eastern Europe operations were sold to Zentiva in 2019.[15] In 2021, it spun off Lotus to a consortium of Innobic and Wessman's investment fund Aztiq, which also bought Alvogen's Malta-based B2B licensing division Adalvo.[16] As of early 2025, Wessman was chairman of Alvogen, as well as of Lotus and Adalvo.[17]
Alvogen was also the original investor in Alvotech, a company founded by Wessman in 2013 that researches and manufactures biosimilars. Alvotech is based in Reykjavik and has four research and production sites across Europe and one in India.[18] It is listed on Nasdaq (ticker: ALVO) and also trades on Nasdaq Iceland. As of early 2025, it has several products approved in the US and Europe and markets globally through partnerships.[19]
Pharmaceuticals
[edit]On its website, Alvogen lists dozens of products it currently offers on the US market. It specializes in products that are either difficult to make or are injectable or inhaled.[20] It's injectables business is called Almaject.
References
[edit]- ^ "Company Overview of Alvogen, Inc". Bloomberg. Retrieved 21 July 2018.
- ^ Press release, "CVC Capital Partners leads investment consortium to acquire controlling stake in Alvogen," Businesswire, 22 June 2015
- ^ Company website product page, https://www.alvogen.com/products
- ^ Wessman steps down as Actavis CEO
- ^ Isenberg, Daniel (9 July 2013). Worthless, Impossible and Stupid: How Contrarian Entrepreneurs Create and Capture Extraordinary Value. Harvard Business Review Press. ISBN 9781422186985 – via Google Books.
- ^ Isenberg, Daniel, et al., "Alvogen: Scaling Entrepreneurship," Harvard Business School case study, 4 August 2018.
- ^ "Alvogen acquires Labormed Pharmaceuticals," The Pharmaletter, 1 February 2013.
- ^ "Alvogen Announces Acquisition To Expand Russian Business," BioSpace, 15 August 2017.
- ^ "Alvogen to acquire majority stake in Kunwha Pharma," The Pharmaletter, 12 October 2012.
- ^ "Alvogen Acquires Korean Dream Pharma for US$ 187 Million," Fierce Pharma, 7 August 2014.
- ^ Company press release, "Alvogen and Lotus Pharmaceuticals Merge Asian Operations to Create Compelling Platform for International Growth," Businesswire, 16 January 2014.
- ^ "County Line Pharmaceuticals to be acquired by Alvogen for $300 million," Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 8 March 2016
- ^ Isenberg et al., op. cit.
- ^ "CVC to Explore Options for $4 Billion Drugmaker Alvogen". 26 September 2017 – via www.bloomberg.com.
- ^ Press release, "Zentiva Extends Commercial Footprint By Completing Acquisition of CEE Business From Alvogen," PR Newswire, 7 April 2020.
- ^ "Aztiq and Innobic acquire Alvogen’s shares in Lotus and Adalvo in $475m deal," Pharma Business International, 1 December 2021
- ^ See company and Wessman's personal websites: https://www.alvogen.com/company/meet-the-chairman, https://www.lotuspharm.com/robert-wessman, https://www.robertwessman.com/operation
- ^ https://www.alvotech.com/office-locations
- ^ https://www.alvotech.com/pipeline
- ^ https://www.alvogen.com/company