Dainippon Sumitomo Pharma – formed by the merger of Dainippon and Sumitomo last month – has reported a solid set of consolidated figures for the fiscal first half ended September 30, helped by solid gain in product sales and cost control measures.

The merged company said its sales went up 5.6% to 84.7 billion yen, higher-than-expected, while operating income also topped forecasts at 8.1 billion yen, up 114% year-on-year. Net income also powered ahead by more than 50% to 4 billion yen, despite a booking of 2.1 billion yen in extraordinary expenses related to the merger during the half year.

Revenue from Dainippon Sumitomo Pharma’s biggest product, the antihypertensive agent Amlodin (amlodipine besylate) grew 5.6% to 28 billion yen, but the star performer in terms of sales growth was antibiotic Meropen (meropenem), which rose 42% to just under 15 billion yen.

Among the other big sellers, revenues from Gasmotin (mosapride citrate) for the improvement of gastrointestinal motility grew 10.4% to 8.5 billion yen, while another fast-growing product was vasodilator Prorenal (limaprost alfadex), which leapt 33% to 6.1 billion yen.

Dainippon Sumitomo Pharma has projected that turnover for the 12 months ending March 2006 will be 245 billion yen.