subsidiary of pfizer industry pharmaceutical founded 1888 ; 128 years ago 1888 as g. d. searle & company headquarters new york city united states products pharmaceutical products website pfizer.com g.d. searle llc is a wholly owned trademark of pfizer . 1 it is currently used mainly as a distribution trademark for various pharmaceuticals that were developed by g. d. searle & company often referred to as searle . prior to its 1985 merger with monsanto searle was a company focusing on life sciences specifically pharmaceuticals agriculture and animal health . searle is most notable for having developed the first female birth control pill and the artificial sweetener nutrasweet . contents 1 history 2 notable products 3 references 4 external links history edit searle was founded in omaha nebraska in 1888 by gideon daniel searle . in 1908 the company was incorporated in chicago and in 1941 the company established headquarters in skokie illinois . donald rumsfeld served as ceo and then as president of searle between 1977 and 1985 . during his tenure at searle rumsfeld reduced the number of employees in the company by 60 % . in 1985 he engineered the acquisition of searle by monsanto corporation . in april 2000 pharmacia corporation was created by merging pharmacia & upjohn which had come about as the result of an earlier merger of the companies pharmacia and upjohn with monsanto and its searle unit . 2 the merged company was based in peapack new jersey . pfizer acquired pharmacia in 2003 and retired the searle name . robert b. shapiro acted as general counsel for the firm from 1979 onwards where he went on develop searle s aspartame product under the brand name nutrasweet . he became ceo of its nutrasweet subsidiary in 1982 . searle s chairman was william l. searle until 1985 . he was a university of michigan graduate and naval reservist and was an officer in the army corps in the early 1950s . 3 in 1993 a team of researchers at searle research and development filed a patent application for celecoxib 4 which searle developed and which became the first selective cox 2 inhibitor to be approved by the fda on december 31 1998 . 5 control of this blockbuster drug was often mentioned as a key reason for pfizer s acquisition of pharmacia . 6 notable products edit the company manufactured prescription drugs and nuclear medicine imaging equipment . searle is known for its release of enovid the first commercial oral contraceptive in 1960 . it is also known for its release of the first bulk laxative metamucil in 1934 ; dramamine for motion sickness ; the cox 2 inhibitors celebrex and bextra ; ambien for insomnia ; and nutrasweet also known as aspartame an artificial sweetener in 1965 . it was released in 1981 by fda . in 1996 the fda removed all restrictions on the use of aspartame which enabled its use in heated and baked goods . g. d. searle s patent on aspartame was extended in 1981 and ultimately expired in december 1992 . 7 references edit http www.pfizer.com about history pfizer pharmacia.jsp pharmacia monsanto merger okd . chicago tribune . march 24 2000 . william l. searle obituary the new york times http www.google.com patents us5466823 http www.accessdata.fda.gov drugsatfda docs nda 98 20998 . cfm frank robert ; hensley scott july 16 2002 . pfizer to buy pharmacia for 60 billion in stock . wall street journal . managing innovation and entrepreneurship in technology based firms by michael j. c. martin external links edit official website the pill v t e pharmaceutical companies of the united states abbott laboratories acorda therapeutics actavis aderis pharmaceuticals adolor corporation alcon alexion pharmaceuticals alkermes allergan alza amgen amylin pharmaceuticals ariad pharmaceuticals aryx therapeutics avax technologies baxter international biocryst pharmaceuticals biogen biolex biovest biovista bradley pharmaceuticals bristol myers squibb cancervax century pharmaceuticals cephalon ceragenix pharmaceuticals combe incorporated cortex pharmaceuticals cotherix covance covidien cubist pharmaceuticals cutter laboratories cytosport cytrx danco laboratories dnaprint genomics epix pharmaceuticals eli lilly and company elorac endo pharmaceuticals ethicon endo surgery ethicon inc. forest laboratories galena biopharma genvec genentech genta gilead sciences hospira imclone systems institute for oneworld health intercept pharmaceuticals ista pharmaceuticals ivax corporation janssen biotech johnson & johnson kinetic concepts king pharmaceuticals kinray kv pharmaceutical leiner health products mallinckrodt martek biosciences corporation s. e. massengill company mckesson corporation mcneil laboratories melior discovery mentholatum merck & co. miles laboratories mylan myriad genetics naurex nereus pharmaceuticals northwest biotherapeutics norwich pharma services novabay pharmaceuticals nuvelo organon international ortho pharmaceutical ortho mcneil pharmaceutical osi pharmaceuticals ovation pharmaceuticals par pharmaceutical parke davis perrigo pfizer pharmaceutical product development prasco laboratories procter & gamble proteon therapeutics purdue pharma qualitest quark pharmaceuticals regeneron repros therapeutics rib x pharmaceuticals sarepta therapeutics savage laboratories schering plough g. d. searle & company sheffield pharmaceuticals smith kline & french spectrum pharmaceuticals sterling drug tanox tap pharmaceutical products tec laboratories teva pharmaceutical industries tiens biotech group titan pharmaceuticals trevena inc trubion upjohn upsher smith laboratories valeant pharmaceuticals ventria bioscience vertex pharmaceuticals verus pharmaceuticals vion pharmaceuticals inc. viropharma west pharmaceutical services wyeth zonite products corporation list of pharmaceutical companies retrieved from https en.wikipedia.org w index.php title g.d. searle llc & oldid 743340281 categories biotechnology companies of the united statescompanies based in skokie illinoishistory of chicagopharmaceutical companies of the united statespfizercompanies established in 1888 navigation menu personal tools not logged intalkcontributionscreate accountlog in namespaces article talk variants views read edit view history more search navigation main pagecontentsfeatured contentcurrent eventsrandom articledonate to wikipediawikipedia store interaction helpabout wikipediacommunity portalrecent changescontact page tools what links hererelated changesupload filespecial pagespermanent linkpage informationwikidata itemcite this page print export create a bookdownload as pdfprintable version languages italiano edit links this page was last modified on 9 october 2016 at 05 24 . text is available under the creative commons attribution sharealike license ; 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