Novartis completes divestment of Nutrition & Santé business unit

20/02/06 Novartis has announced that it has completed the divestment of its Nutrition & Santé business unit pursuant to the agreement signed in November 2005 with funds managed by ABN AMRO Capital France.

Nutrition & Santé holds the remaining dietary food assets of the former "Health and Functional Food" business unit, which were not sold to Associated British Foods plc in November 2002. At the time of the divestiture, Nutrition & Santé was classified as a non-core asset and has since been included within the Medical Nutrition business unit results.

Novartis AG is a world leader in offering medicines to protect health, cure disease and improve well-being. Our goal is to discover, develop and successfully market innovative products to treat patients, ease suffering and enhance the quality of life. Novartis is the only company with leadership positions in both patented and generic pharmaceuticals. We are strengthening our medicine-based portfolio, which is focused on strategic growth platforms in innovation-driven pharmaceuticals, high-quality and low-cost generics and leading self-medication OTC brands. In 2005, the Group’s businesses achieved net sales of USD 32.2 billion and net income of USD 6.1 billion. Approximately USD 4.8 billion was invested in R&D. Headquartered in Basel, Switzerland, Novartis Group companies employ approximately 91,000 people and operate in over 140 countries around the world.

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