fate acquired as a subsidiary of novartis founded 1981 headquarters emeryville california usa products biopharmaceuticals vaccines blood testing revenue 1.921 billion 2005 number of employees 5 400 2005 parent novartis website www.chiron.com chiron corporation was an american multinational biotechnology firm based in emeryville california that was acquired by novartis international ag on april 20 2006 . it had offices and facilities in eighteen countries on five continents . chiron s business and research was in three main areas biopharmaceuticals vaccines and blood testing . chiron s vaccines and blood testing units were combined to form novartis vaccines and diagnostics while chiron biopharmaceuticals was integrated into novartis pharmaceuticals . in 2014 novartis completed the sale of its blood transfusion diagnostics unit novartis diagnostics to grifols s.a. barcelona spain and announced agreements for the sale of its vaccines unit novartis vaccines . contents 1 early history 2 expansion 3 products and other acquisitions 4 lawsuits 5 bombings 6 the end of chiron 7 products 8 see also 9 references 10 external links early history edit chiron ka r n ky r n after the centaur from greek mythology 1 was founded in 1981 by chairman william j. rutter president and chief executive professor edward penhoet and vice president for research pablo dt valenzuela . all were academics from the university of california ; penhoet at berkeley where he continued to lecture and the others from san francisco . 1 chiron formed a partnership with the swiss pharmaceutical giant ciba geigy ltd. 1 through the biocine company 2 3 to use genetic engineering to develop vaccines and to treat prevent and diagnose diseases such as aids herpes and malaria . 1 4 other partnerships included thicon inc. to develop a growth factor hormone for the treatment of wounds and merck & co to develop an improvement to their existing hepatitis b vaccine . 1 in 1986 professor penhoet said our business strategy is to dominate small markets rather than take a small presence in a broad market . the niche that chiron was focusing on was ophthalmology which mr. penhoet said was big enough to be interesting but small enough to service with 40 salespeople . 1 professor penhoet also stated that chiron was set up to provide the enabling technology for others to use under license 1 and later saying that chiron was as close to a virtual corporation as you can be with few fixed assets but more relationships . 5 expansion edit in 1988 chiron formed a joint venture company called mimesys inc. with johnson & johnson and the warner lambert company to develop the next generation of biotech drugs . 6 the following year chiron recruited gregory lawless who had come from dupont to take over as president and ceo . 7 this led to additional buying that included the acquisition of du pont in partnership with ortho diagnostic systems ; 8 munich based adatomed gmbh ; 9 and a merger with fellow biotech company cetus corporation 10 after cetus failed to get approval for its drug interleukin 2 . 11 hollings renton of cetus became president and ceo when gregory lawless agreed to leave . 2 mr renton resigned in 1992 12 and was replaced by sean lance from glaxo wellcome in 1998 13 and finally by howard pien from glaxosmithkline in 2003 . 14 after the acquisition of cetus chiron split its operations among five entities cetus oncology for cancer drugs ; the biocine company for vaccines ; chiron diagnostics for blood screening and other diagnostic tests later sold to bayer ag for 1.1 billion 15 ; chiron intraoptics for eye surgery and chiron technologies for research and development . 5 products and other acquisitions edit in 1992 the company s first product proleukin was approved in united states for the treatment of metastatic melanoma ; previously it was only approved for use with kidney cancer . 16 this was followed a year later by betaseron a beta interferon the first treatment for relapsing remitting multiple sclerosis and made by berlex laboratories inc. 17 18 in 1997 chiron provided the active ingredient becaplermin in regranex a topical treatment for diabetic foot ulcers manufactured by ortho mcneil pharmaceutical inc. 19 in 2001 chiron acquired pathogenesis for its antibiotic drug tobi 20 the first inhaled antibiotic approved for treating lung infections in cystic fibrosis patients . 21 having launched its first vaccine product fluad an adjuvant influenza vaccine in 1996 the vaccine line was expanded significantly in 1998 with the acquisition of the european vaccine businesses of behring germany and sclavo italy . this was followed in 2003 by the acquisition of powderject the uk based vaccines company making chiron the second largest flu vaccines provider and the fifth largest vaccines business in the world . 22 23 in 1998 chiron s nucleic acid testing nat blood testing business was launched in cooperation with gen probe followed a year later by the launch of the procleix system which detects viral rna and dna in donated blood and plasma during the very early stages of infection when those infectious agents are present but can not be detected by immunodiagnostic tests . chiron expanded its cancer drug portfolio in 2002 with the acquisition of matrix pharmaceuticals inc and its product tezacitebine . 24 chiron also manufactured the mmr vaccine measles mumps and rubella at its liverpool plant . 25 chiron in conjunction with crucell now part of johnson & johnson developed a pentavalent vaccine called quinvaxem targeting 5 diseases in children . lawsuits edit when in 1991 cetus was acquired it was subject to a lawsuit by the eastman kodak company over the rights to the polymerase chain reaction product which was settled in 1993 . 18 in 1998 chiron filed patent infringement suits in europe japan and the us against roche over its hepatitis c hcv products . chiron was the first to clone hcv in 1987 after five years of research and had since filed over 100 hcv related patents in over 20 countries . 26 a settlement was reached where roche holding a.g. agreed to buy the global semi exclusive nucleic acid test nat patents for hcv and hiv from chiron . 20 bayer the company which bought chiron diagnostics sued chiron corporation in 2002 citing that it hid patent and equipment problems from them during purchase negotiations . 27 the case filed in delaware alleged breach of warranty fraud negligent misrepresentation violation of the duty of good faith and fair dealing and breach of contract claims in connection with the acquisition . 28 in 2004 chiron attracted adverse media coverage after the uk government suspended its license for manufacturing fluvirin an influenza vaccine at its plant in liverpool england . this action left the united states government short of the vaccine . it later emerged that the food and drug administration fda may have been aware of the problem nine months earlier but a miscommunication between the company and the fda left the problem unsolved until the mhra medicines and healthcare products regulatory agency the british equivalent of the fda stepped in and suspended chiron s license . 29 the company undertook a remediation program and succeeded in restoring the manufacturing license from mhra in 2005 . however the incident resulted in a class action lawsuit for nearly 280m being brought against chiron and its executive for allegedly in 2003 overstating its ability to manufacture and ship the vaccine fluvirin thus allowing novartis to buy chiron shares below market value when the plant temporarily closed down . the amount settled in 2008 was for 30m . 30 bombings edit on august 27 2003 two bombs exploded at chiron s headquarters in emeryville california . 31 a group calling itself revolutionary cells e mailed a statement to reporters taking credit for the bombing and claimed that their action was due to chiron s past contracts with huntingdon life sciences a contract research firm that conducts experiments on animals . the fbi has named daniel andreas san diego as the lead suspect and placed him on its fbi most wanted terrorists list . 32 33 the end of chiron edit novartis corporation was the result of a merger between sandoz laboratories and ciba geigy in 1996 and owned slightly less than half of chiron 34 as part of a federal trade commission order . 35 several of sandoz s subsidiaries were sold off for reasons of anti monopoly legislation . 35 in 2005 novartis made an offer to buy chiron . initially this offer was rebuffed but after the bid was substantially enhanced chiron was sold and became part of novartis in april 2006 . 36 a year later parts of ex chiron were sold in part and leased in part to bayer . 37 in 2011 bayer announced it was withdrawing from a manufacturing plant it had leased from novartis . 38 and novartis finally divested most of the former chiron assets in 2013 as part of a global reorganization . 39 products edit agrippal begrivac fluad fluvirin see also edit novartis medicines and healthcare products regulatory agency british medical association food and drug administration references edit a b c d e f g lawrence m. fisher october 13 1986 . biotechnology spotlight now shines on chiron . the new york times . a b chiron cetus management . the new york times . november 26 1991 . chiron to get 20 million . the new york times . november 15 1998 . loss at chiron is attributed to ciba alliance . the new york times . may 9 1995 . a b lawrence m. fisher april 4 1993 . a new model for biotechnology . the new york times . chiron research unit . the new york times . october 4 1988 . lawrence m. fisher march 3 1989 . specialist in diagnostics now president of chiron . the new york times . chiron ortho pact for du pont unit . the new york times . january 3 1990 . chiron acquisition . the new york times . april 12 1991 . andrew pollack july 23 1991 . 2 biotech pioneers to merge . the new york times . lawrence m. fisher april 17 1992 . price of failure in biotechnology . the new york times . chiron s president quits . the new york times . december 8 1992 . chief executive named at chiron . the new york times . march 24 1998 . chiron hires glaxosmithkline executive as chief . the new york times . march 21 2003 . john tagliabue september 18 1998 . bayer buying chiron unit and stake in seed venture ; agfa offering set . the new york times . lawrence m. fisher december 20 1997 . f.d.a. panel recommends approval of a chiron drug . the new york times . milt freudenheim july 24 1993 . f.d.a. approves a multiple sclerosis drug . the new york times . a b chiron company profile . the new york times . august 5 1993 . fda clears regranex becaplermin gel 0.01 % for diabetic foot ulcers ; chiron to supply active ingredient to ortho mcneil . . december 17 1997 . a b andrew pollack august 15 2000 . chiron to acquire pathogenesis for 700 million . the new york times . fda approves inhaled antibiotic for management of cystic fibrosis patients . fda . december 22 1997 . chiron corporation history . chiron corporation powderject pharmaceuticals plc . uk office of fair trading . july 7 2003 . chiron to buy matrix maker of cancer drug . the new york times . january 8 2002 . chiron vaccines starts work on new state of the art vaccines manufacturing plant . northwest regional development agency . february 27 2004 . bw healthwire april 16 1998 . chiron files infringement suit in japan against roche on hcv patent . the free library . bayer sues over medical acquisition . the new york