FDBusiness.com

Nestle Health Science a fully owned subsidiary of Nestlé, and the pharmaceutical and healthcare group Chi-Med, have agreed to form a 50/50 joint venture to be named Nutrition Science Partners (NSP). NSP will research, develop, manufacture and market innovative nutritional and medicinal products derived from botanical plants.

The new partnership will give Nestlé Health Science access to one of the world’s leading Traditional Chinese Medicine libraries. NSP will focus on gastrointestinal health and may in the future expand into the metabolic disease and brain health areas.

The new partnership gives Nestlé Health Science access to Chi-Med’s traditional Chinese medicine library of more than 50,000 extracts from over 1,200 different herbal plants and its world-class expertise. This includes the access to use the botanical research and development platform in gastrointestinal areas, which includes discovery research, non-clinical and pharmaceutical science functions and an understanding of the botanical guidelines and regulations.

“This joint venture provides Nestlé Health Science with an opportunity to develop and commercialise truly innovative and scientifically validated botanical-based nutrition for personalised healthcare in gastrointestinal health,” says Luis Cantarell, President and Chief Executive Officer for Nestlé Health Science. “Nestlé Health Science will bring unique competencies in nutritional sciences, diagnostics and commercial capabilities, and Chi-Med will provide its best-in-class traditional Chinese medicine library and discovery platform, which will be the basis of Nutrition Science Partners’ future gastrointestinal pipeline.”