Sinopharm drops plan to take China Traditional Chinese Medicine private

China Traditional Chinese Medicine Holdings said on Wednesday its parent Sinopharm had decided not to proceed with a possible privatisation of the Chinese medicine maker.

Earlier this year, Reuters had reported that a consortium led by Sinopharm planned to take China Traditional Chinese Medicine Holdings (China TCM) private, in a deal that valued the firm at least $3.3 billion at the time.

China TCM also said the offer period in relation to the possible privatisation ended on Aug. 11.

China National Pharmaceutical Group Corporation, commonly referred to as Sinopharm, is a Chinese state-owned enterprise. The corporation was the indirect major shareholder of publicly traded companies Sinopharm Group, China Traditional Chinese Medicine.

Sinopharm has built a nationwide logistic and distributing network for drugs and medical devices and equipment, including 5logistic hubs, more than 40 provincial-level centers and over 240 municipal-level logistic sites.

Sinopharm has an applied pharmaceutical research institute and an engineering design institute, both taking a leading position in China. Two Academicians of Chinese Academy of Engineering, 11 national R&D institutes, 44 provincial-level technology centers and over 5,000 scientists have made remarkable achievements.

Sinopharm also chaired in setting over 530 national technical criteria, among which the EV71 vaccine, a first category new drug of China with Sinopharm holding complete independent intellectual property right, reduces the morbidity of hand-foot-and mouth disease among Chinese children. The R&D and launch of sIPV ensures the progress of the national immunization program for polio.

Earlier in May, the World Health Organization (WHO) also approved for emergency use the COVID-19 vaccine developed by Sinopharm.