History
In March 1995 Glaxo and Wellcome merged to form Glaxo Wellcome. Glaxo Wellcome acquired the California-based Affymax, a leader in the field of combinatorial chemistry. Queen Elizabeth II opened Glaxo Wellcome's Medicines Research Centre at Stevenage in England. Valtrex (valaciclovir) was launched by Glaxo Wellcome as an anti-herpes successor to Zovirax (acyclovir).
In June 1995 Glaxo Wellcome announced the closure of its research and development facility in Beckenham, Kent, which employed 1,550 staff and was formerly Wellcome's principal research and development facility in the United Kingdom. The facilty was closed over three years, with development work moved to the company's R&D facility in Stevenage.
In September 1995 Glaxo Wellcome announced plans to cut 7,500 jobs worldwide as part of a programme to reduce costs by £1.2 billion per year. Around 1,700 of the job cuts were in the United Kingdom.
In 1996, researchers in its Geneva based GBRI research institute laid the foundation of now a leading commercial massive parallel sequencing technology.
In October 1999 Glaxo Wellcome announced plans to cut 3,400 jobs, of which 1,700 were based in the United Kingdom. As part of the cuts secondary manufacturing activities at its Dartford, Kent facility were phased out, with the loss of about 1,500 jobs.
Glaxo Wellcome and SmithKline Beecham announced their intention to merge on 17 January 2000. Following receipt of necessary regulatory approvals, the merger was completed in December 2000, forming GlaxoSmithKline.
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