Merck Group

Not to be confused with Merck & Co. (d.b.a. MSD outside U.S. and Canada), its former subsidiary and now an independent company.

Merck KGaA
Company typePublic
Industry
Founded1668; 356 years ago (1668)
FounderFriedrich Jacob Merck
Headquarters
Darmstadt
,
Germany
Area served
Worldwide
Key people
ProductsLiquid crystals, life science and performance chemicals, Bioprocessing-Solutions, small molecules and biopharmaceuticals
RevenueDecrease €20.99 billion (2023)
Decrease €3.609 billion (2023)
Decrease €2.834 billion (2023)
Total assetsDecrease €48.49 billion (2023)
Total equityIncrease €26.68 billion (2023)
Owner
Number of employees
62,908 (2023)
Websitemerckgroup.com
Footnotes / references
[1][2][3][4][5]

The Merck Group, branded and commonly known as Merck, is a German multinational science and technology company headquartered in Darmstadt, with about 60,000 employees and a presence in 66 countries. The group includes around 250 companies; the main company is Merck KGaA in Germany. The company is divided into three business lines: Healthcare, Life Sciences and Electronics. Merck was founded in 1668 and is the world's oldest operating chemical and pharmaceutical company, as well as one of the largest pharmaceutical companies globally.[6][7]

Merck operates in Europe, Africa, Asia, Oceania and the Americas. It has major research and development centres in Darmstadt, Boston, Tokyo and Beijing, as well as other Research and Development units in Taiwan, France, Israel, South Korea, India, and the UK.[8] Merck pioneered the commercial manufacture of morphine in the 19th century and for a time held a virtual monopoly on cocaine.

Merck was privately owned until going public on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange in 1995 and is listed on the DAX index of Germany's top companies. The Merck family still controls a majority of 70.3% of the company's shares. The Merck Group includes around 250 companies in 180 countries; the current main parent company of the group, since 1995, is named Merck KGaA, and is itself mainly owned by the former main parent company, E. Merck oHG, which now operates as a holding company.

The American pharmaceutical company Merck & Co. was established as a subsidiary of Merck in 1891, but was nationalized by the United States in 1917, before being privatized again when George W. Merck, a member of an American branch of the Merck family, repurchased the stock in 1919.[9] It is known as MSD (Merck Sharp and Dohme) outside of North America. The original Merck of Darmstadt holds the rights to the name Merck in all countries except the U.S. and Canada, where it is known as EMD (Emanuel Merck, Darmstadt), and the life science business specifically is known as MilliporeSigma. In 2015 Merck adopted a uniform brand identity for all its subsidiaries, and the company has stressed its intention to protect the brand of "the real Merck" globally and initiated litigation against its former subsidiary over use of the name.[10]

In 2018, the company celebrated their 350th anniversary.[11] Merck has formed a strategic alliance with the Technische Universität Darmstadt, which is located in the same town as Merck.[12]

  1. ^ "2023 Annual Report" (PDF). Merck KGaA. Retrieved 24 March 2024.
  2. ^ "About us – Merck KGaA, Darmstadt, Germany" (PDF).
  3. ^ "Capital structure and governance bodies of Merck KGaA | Annual Report 2015, Merck KGaA, Darmstadt, Germany".
  4. ^ "Merck KGaA, Darmstadt, Germany Annual Report 2016 | Merck KGaA, Darmstadt, Germany Annual Report 2016". Archived from the original on 26 December 2017.
  5. ^ "Shareholder – Investors | Merck KGaA, Darmstadt, Germany".
  6. ^ "Merck: Das älteste Chemieunternehmen der Welt". Manager Magazin (in German). 21 September 2006. Retrieved 6 July 2023.
  7. ^ Richter, Martin; Gomez, Isabel (21 January 2010). "Zum Verwechseln gleich". Financial Times Deutschland (in German). Archived from the original on 26 July 2010.
  8. ^ "GLOBAL R&D HUBS Merck KGaA, Darmstadt, Germany".
  9. ^ "Our History Timeline". Archived from the original on 6 November 2009. Retrieved 2 April 2018.
  10. ^ Connolly, Allison; Kitamura, Makiko (10 February 2014). "A Tale of Two Mercks as Protesters Take On Wrong Company". Bloomberg. Archived from the original on 13 May 2015. Retrieved 6 July 2023.
  11. ^ "Merck gears up for its 350th Anniversary". Bio Spectrum. 8 February 2018. Retrieved 2 November 2018. Merck is celebrating its 350th anniversary. The theme of the celebration will be "Always curious – Imagine the next 350 years".
  12. ^ Darmstadt, Technische Universität. "Strategische Partnerschaften". Technische Universität Darmstadt (in German). Archived from the original on 29 September 2020. Retrieved 29 July 2019.