Natco Pharma Ltd. has lined up an investment of Rs. 300 crore for new units and to enhance existing capacities.

"We are going for an aggressive capex in Andhra Pradesh, Telangana and Tamil Nadu," its Vice-Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Rajeev Nannapaneni told newspersons recently.

As part of the programme, the Rs. 850-crore firm is setting up a formulations facility in the Pharma City in Visakhapatnam which will be ready by the end of next year. "In addition, we will be expanding research and development facility, chemical manufacturing facilities in Telangana and Chennai, as also the formulation facility in Hyderabad,"the CEO said. While the Visakhapatnam unit will use up "Rs. 120 crore, the chemical division and the formulations facility in Hyderabad might absorb about Rs. 100 crore and Rs. 50 crore, respectively.

Natco recently received approval from the Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB) to raise up to Rs. 450 crore by issuing securities to Qualified Institutional Buyers.

The FIPB has given its nod to a proposal for increasing foreign investment limit from 24 per cent to 31.5 per cent of the paid-up equity share capital of the company. However, Natco is tight lipped on the timing of the issue.

"We have all the needed resolutions in place but the quantum of timing of the issue will be decided in due course," Nannapaneni said.

On the product pipeline, he said two or three products will be launched in the domestic market by end of this year.

"In the US market, we have about five good product launches lined up after January 2016."

The recently launched Hepatitis C drug is 'doing well' for the company and is contributing Rs. 11 crore revenue per month.