United Arab Emirates-based drugmaker Neopharma and ASKA Pharmaceuticals of Tokyo entered a joint venture to build a $53 million (?350-crore) pharmaceutical manufacturing facility to be operated by Neopharma subsidiary Omnicare Drugs India in Visakhapatnam.

The plant is expected to open by 2020 and will produce oral solid dosage forms, oral liquids and topical preparations. The capacity of the facility is projected at 3 billion tablets a year, The Hindu reported.

The joint venture aims to manufacture drugs for chronic therapies in cardiovascular diseases, the central nervous system and diabetes, along with other products from key therapeutic classes targeting Japan and the world market.

Construction is set to begin this month at a site in J.N. Pharma City. The company said it will seek cGMP accreditation from all major global health regulatory bodies.

"The partnership will enable us to transfer skills and knowledge locally," B.R. Shetty, Neopharma’s chairman, said in a statement.

Last summer, Neopharma announced it would build a $100 million plant in Abu Dhabi. That news came just weeks after the drugmaker said it would spend more than twice that for manufacturing plant and development rights to a diabetes treatment in Japan.

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