Accelerating private equity investments in India

Mumbai – PAG, a leading global investment firm, announced today that its private equity strategy, along with consortium partners CX Partners and Samara Capital, has completed the acquisition of a controlling stake in the Optimus Group, a Hyderabad, India-based pharmaceutical firm, through the API platform, Sekhmet Pharmaventures.

Founded in 2004, Optimus is a vertically integrated manufacturer of pharmaceutical products including advanced intermediates, active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) and finished drugs. It currently exports more than 100 products to 40 countries.

Nikhil Srivastava, Partner and Managing Director, Head of India Private Equity for PAG, commented: “We are excited to partner with Srini and the team at Optimus as it embarks on a new phase of growth. We look forward to supporting Optimus to continue to invest in its R&D, manufacturing capabilities and intellectual property management, and serve the health needs of people in India and across the globe.”

Dr. D. Srinivas Reddy, the founder of Optimus, said: “Sekhmet’s investment significantly boosts our product development capabilities, and further enables us to achieve our ambition of becoming a leading global API producer. We look forward to working with PAG consortium to build our portfolio to deliver high quality, affordable health products, and offer our customers industry-leading products across a wide spectrum of medical needs.”

The deal follows the acquisition of Anjan Drugs in 2020 by the consortium, which aims to develop a best-in-class center for the development and production of bulk drug ingredients.

PAG views India as a particularly attractive market. With this transaction, PAG has invested more than USD700 million in private equity in India over the last two years across multiple sectors.