GlaxoSmithKline plc (lse: GSK nyse: GSK) is a United Kingdom-based pharmaceutical, biological, and healthcare company. GSK is the world's second largest pharmaceutical company and a research-based company with a wide portfolio of pharmaceutical products covering anti-infectives, central nervous system (CNS), respiratory, gastro-intestinal/metabolic, oncology, and vaccines products. It also has a Consumer Healthcare operation comprising leading oral healthcare products, nutritional drinks, and over the counter (OTC) medicines.

History

GSK was formed by the merger of GlaxoWellcome (formed from the mergers of Burroughs Wellcome & Company and Glaxo Laboratories), and SmithKline Beecham (from Beecham, and SmithKline Beckman).

GlaxoWellcome

In 1880, Burroughs Wellcome & Company was founded in London by American pharmacists Henry Wellcome and Silas Burroughs.GSK History The Wellcome Tropical Research Laboratories opened in 1902. In 1959 the Wellcome Company bought McDougall & Robertson Inc. to become more active in animal health. The Wellcome Company production centre was moved from New York to North Carolina in 1970 and the following year another research centre was built.

Glaxo was founded in Bunnythorpe, New Zealand in 1904. Originally Glaxo was a baby food manufacturer processing local milk into a baby food by the same name: the product was sold in the 1930s under the slogan "Glaxo builds bonny babies". Still visible on the main street of Bunnythorpe is a derelict dairy factory (factory for drying and processing cows' milk into powder) with the original Glaxo logo clearly visible, but nothing to indicate that this was the start of a major multinational company.

Glaxo became Glaxo Laboratories, and opened new units in London in 1935. Glaxo Laboratories bought two companies called Joseph Nathan and Allen & Hanburys in 1947 and 1958 respectively. After the Company bought Meyer Laboratories in 1978, it started to play an important role in the US market. In 1983 the American arm Glaxo Inc. moved to Research Triangle Park (US headquarters/research) and Zebulon (US manufacturing) in North Carolina. Burroughs Wellcome and Glaxo merged in 1995 to form GlaxoWellcome. In the same year, GlaxoWellcome opened their Medicine Research Centre in Stevenage, England. Three years later GlaxoWellcome bought Polfa Poznan Company in Poland.

SmithKline Beecham

In 1843, Thomas Beecham launched his Beecham's Pills laxative in England giving birth to the Beecham Group. Beechams opened its first factory in St Helens, Lancashire, England for rapid production of medicines in 1859. By the 1960s it was extensively involved in pharmaceuticals.