Our Journey

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Viatris: A bold history and bright future

Imagine if we were all focused on healthcare not as it is, but as it should be – and we did everything we could to make it happen. That’s the aim of newly launched global pharmaceutical company Viatris. Formed by the combination of Mylan and Upjohn, Viatris is focused on empowering people to live healthier at every stage of life.

Viatris reaches patients in more than 165 countries and territories with more than 1,400 molecules spanning approximately 10 therapeutic areas, employs approximately 38,000 people, operates approximately 40 manufacturing sites and has a 24/7 research and development platform committed to innovating around the clock to meet unmet needs. Our company’s unique Global Healthcare Gateway is powered by Viatris’ Global Healthcare Gateway® unmatched global infrastructure and expertise, which will offer others the ability to further empower their own assets to reach more patients worldwide by leveraging our global commercial reach, global supply chain, expansive regulatory and technical expertise and global cost efficient manufacturing platform.

165+
countries and territories
1,400+
molecules
10+
therapeutic areas
~38,000
employees worldwide
~40
manufacturing sites

Breaking from the traditional conventions that have ruled the pharmaceutical industry for nearly a century, the company is both large-scale and agile, persistent and reliable. Through worldwide reach combined with local touch, Viatris is filling a critical need: providing access to patients who need high quality medicine, wherever they are.

To do this, Viatris is building on the hallmark traits of its legacy companies, including integrity, quality, a bias for fast action and a profound belief in doing what’s right, not what’s easy. How Viatris came to be, and the potential for its future, is a story worth telling.

 

The evolution of Mylan

Increasing access to medicine for patients in the U.S.

For nearly 60 years, increasing access to high quality medicine and improving patient health was Mylan’s mission. Mylan was founded in 1961 in White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia, to ensure access to affordable medicine in difficult-to-reach communities.

In the early years, the company then known as “Milan,” named after one of the company’s co-founders, Milan “Mike” Puskar, bought finished dose medicines and resold them from the trunk of a Pontiac Bonneville to rural pharmacies and physicians throughout the Appalachian region of the U.S.

Later, manufacturing operations began in Morgantown, West Virginia. The team there initially made vitamins and empty gelatin capsules but soon switched focus. In 1966, Mylan received approval to manufacture penicillin G – Mylan’s first U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approval. The antibiotic marked the company’s entrance into generic pharmaceuticals, creating an opportunity to serve patients in a new and more expansive way.

As Mylan’s vision grew, so did the company. In 1972, Milan changed its name to Mylan Laboratories as a way to highlight its technical expertise and to make it easier for investors to find the company at the end of the fine-print stock listings in newspapers after the first shares of Mylan stock began trading under the ticker symbol MYLN.

Relentless in its efforts to expand access, Mylan steadily grew its own product line and the number of customers it reached. In 1984, it broke new ground with the introduction of an antihypertensive called Maxzide®, making Mylan the first generics manufacturer in the world to patent a new drug. This milestone was the precursor of future research and development capabilities, which would help build one of the most robust pipelines in the industry.

The 1990s was spent strategically acquiring a number of companies to establish an even stronger presence in the pharmaceutical industry. In 1995, Mylan had the most dispensed line of pharmaceuticals in America, brand or generic.

 

Expanding Mylan's global presence

Mylan’s steady growth from 1976 to the early 2000s was achieved through a focus on enhancing operations and developing new medicines. In February 2002, Robert J. Coury was elected to the board of directors and became chief executive officer in September of that same year. Coury scaled the company virtually overnight from operating in a single country to reaching countries around the world by acquiring a majority stake in Matrix Laboratories and completing the acquisition of Merck KGaA’s generics business. Rajiv Malik joined the Mylan team at that time and was instrumental in securing many key partnerships for the company, displaying a unique ability for identifying scientifically strong, operationally sound and commercially robust collaborators.

In 2011, Mylan celebrated its golden anniversary. A year later, the company would make history again, naming Heather Bresch as chief executive officer – the first woman to run a Fortune 500 pharmaceutical company. Bresch began her career at Mylan in 1992 and held roles of increasing responsibility in more than 15 functional areas, uniquely positioning her to take Mylan to the next level.

The year Bresch was named chief executive officer, Mylan led the way with industry partners to advocate for the 2012 Generic Drug User Fee Act (GDUFA), which increased the FDA’s ability to perform critical program functions and created quicker access to medicines for patients as well as passage of the FDA Safety and Innovation Act of 2012, which updated a 1938 U.S. law to hold all pharmaceutical manufacturers to the same high quality standards regardless of whether abroad or in the U.S. While leading the company, Bresch instilled not only disciplined global processes, infrastructure and diversification following Mylan’s transformative acquisitions but also a future-focused strategy.

Much of the decade saw Mylan continuing its evolution while growing its commitment to patients in countries large and small, and across multiple product lines and capabilities. During this time, Mylan became well known for its expertise in smoothly integrating acquisitions, including the 2015 purchase of Abbott’s branded specialty and generics lines in the world’s developed markets, Renaissance and Meda in 2016 and Apicore in 2017, all of which expanded Mylan’s portfolio and capabilities in manufacturing, R&D and active pharmaceutical ingredients (API).

Viatris is the culmination of Mylan’s strategic efforts to increase scale in all areas – geographic reach, R&D, manufacturing, API, combined product portfolio and global commercial footprint.

The legacy of Upjohn

Solving the burden of noncommunicable diseases with an iconic portfolio

Born out of Pfizer’s Established Medicines division, Upjohn was created as a standalone business in 2018 within Pfizer. Its mission was to relieve the burden of noncommunicable diseases (NCDs) with trusted, quality medicines for every patient, everywhere.

With a rapidly expanding global middle class across emerging markets, particularly in Asia, and an enhanced focus on quality and affordable healthcare by policymakers worldwide, there had never been a more pressing time to focus on addressing the rising public health impact of NCDs. Michael Goettler was tapped to lead the new business, bringing with him more than two decades of industry experience, including a number of senior leadership roles at Pfizer.

Upjohn was set up to act with speed and flexibility, backed by a solid foundation and strong Pfizer legacy of quality, compliance and reliability. Its distinct and fully dedicated manufacturing, marketing and regulatory functions enabled Upjohn to operate as a true standalone business within Pfizer.

Upjohn’s world-class commercial, manufacturing and medical expertise was underpinned by a fast, focused and flexible culture that empowered the team to take action, to focus on what matters most and deliver on commitments while remaining dynamic, open-minded and creative.

At the heart of everything Upjohn did were its patients, its people and the quality of its business. These were the cornerstones of the company’s efforts to build a healthier world for everyone.

 

Leadership in emerging markets and China

Upjohn’s deeply rooted belief that everyone deserves good health powered the company’s efforts to find scalable, feasible and effective ways to better patients’ lives. Despite significant medical advancements in the prevention and treatment of chronic conditions, NCDs, like cardiovascular disease, continue to be the leading causes of death and disability globally, particularly in emerging markets. To conquer these challenges, Upjohn had the portfolio, experience and expertise to make this belief a reality.

Key to this success was the strength of Upjohn’s portfolio, which included complex generics and biosimilars, and harnessed the power of some of the world’s most recognized brands, including CELEBREX® (celecoxib capsules), DILANTIN® (extended phenytoin sodium capsules, USP), LIPITOR® (atorvastatin calcium), LYRICA® (pregabalin) and VIAGRA® (sildenafil citrate) – category-leading products across cardiovascular, pain, mental health and urology therapeutic areas.

Building a healthier world for everyone – and delivering better outcomes for patients – is Upjohn’s legacy. By marrying its global footprint and the resources of a world-class multinational with the mindset of a startup, the business was set to anticipate change and capture growth opportunities.


The birth of Viatris

In July 2019, the creation of a new company combining Mylan with Upjohn was announced. Together, their strengths offered a unique and powerful platform to change healthcare in ways that hadn’t been realized before.

Mylan brought a diverse portfolio across many geographies and key therapeutic areas as well as a robust pipeline, high quality manufacturing and supply chain excellence. Upjohn brought trusted, iconic brands and proven commercialization capabilities, including leadership positions in China and other emerging markets. Upjohn’s focus on noncommunicable diseases paired nicely with Mylan’s long history of fighting infectious disease. Combining the two complementary businesses would transform and accelerate the ability of each to serve patients’ needs and expand the companies’ capabilities across more than 165 markets.

Named Viatris, the Mylan-Upjohn combination starts life committed to empowering people to live healthier at every stage of life with some 38,000 employees worldwide, and a sustainable, diverse and differentiated product line and pipeline. Perhaps most important, Viatris has a powerful combination of best-in-class capabilities and world-class management from its founding companies, charting the company’s course for the next decade and beyond: Robert J. Coury as executive chairman, Michael Goettler as chief executive officer, Rajik Malik as president and Sanjeev Narula as chief financial officer.

 

A path to success

The new company’s name is rooted in Latin and embodies a vision of providing a path (“VIA”) to three (“TRIS”) critical goals: expanding access to medicines, leading by innovating to meet patient needs, and being a trusted partner for the healthcare community worldwide.

If past is prologue, then the future of Viatris is bright, as it embarks on its new journey to increase access to important medicines for patients who need them around the world.


*Not all of the products mentioned on Viatris.com have been approved for use in all countries. To learn which products have been approved for use in a particular country, please visit that country’s page for a full listing of available drug products.