Japan's Takeda Pharmaceutical is allocating $569 million (¥50 billion) for the acquisition of new products over the next three years, in addition to money it has set aside for new drug purchases, says Mitsuo Oguri, a spokesman for the global company. In May, Takeda announced its 2010-2012 New Mid-Range Plan, including actions intended to drive growth by moving to “rigorously reset to a lower cost base” by cutting some ten percent of its global staff of 19,000—some 1,400 in the United States, plus about 500 international workers—and accelerating new product launches.

Takeda needs to create new revenue as it faces lost income from patent expirations, such as those covering drugs like Prevacid and Actos.

In particular, Takeda has expressed its interest in building its presence in the areas of oncology, central nervous system ailments, metabolic and cardiovascular diseases, as well as immunology and inflammatory diseases.

So far, that interest has taken the form of licensing deals rather than product acquisitions, such as the company's agreement to license CellCentric's cancer-related epigenetic target technologies in February and its collaboration with AMAG Pharmaceuticals on anemia, announced in April.

The company expects its market share in Europe and North America to support the lion's share of its sales growth, with new contributions from its entry into China and other Asian markets accounting for gradually bigger pieces of the pie through 2013. In June, the company announced it was establishing a new commercial subsidiary in South Korea, “a key market for Takeda’s Asian strategy,” according to the company.

The company aims to increase its global market coverage to approximately 90 percent by the end of fiscal 2012.

News of the set-aside for product purchases was originally reported in the Daily Yomiuri newspaper.