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Drug maker Warner Chilcott is expected to announce a takeover of Procter & Gamble’s prescription drug business worth $3 billion (£1.8bn).
The speculation comes after Cincinnati-based P&G said last year that it was looking to leave the prescription drug business.
However, the P&G spokesman Tom Millikin said that the consumer products company does not respond to rumour or speculation.
Products made by the company for that area of business generate more than $1 billion (£0.6bn) in annual revenue alone and if a deal was done with Ireland-based Warner Chilcott, it would expand its revenue and dominance of the women’s health market.
Warner Chilcott, which makes birth-control pills, acne medication and female hormone therapies, has forecast annual sales of just over $1 billion (£600 million) for this fiscal year.
But private-equity firm Cerberus Capital Management and drug maker Forest Laboratories are also reported to be interested in the P&G division.
P&G’s latest ambitions to sell come after it sold off its Folgers coffee business to JM Smucker and added beauty and grooming businesses to its portfolio.
Copyright Press Association 2009
