(Photo : UCB)

July 19^th, according to Reuters, Chinese authorities have visited the office of Belgian drugmaker UCB. It indicates that China has widened its investigation into bribery in the pharmaceutical sector, following the scandal of British drugmaker GlaxoSmithKline.

Like Us on Facebook

Chinese police have accused GSK of bribing Chinese officials and doctors to promote sales, at the same time, raise the price of its drugs. China wants to show its hard line against malpractice by multinationals operating in the country.

A spokesman from UCB said: "China's State Administration For Industry and Commerce has visited us. They've been launching inspections with several pharma companies active in the country, both Chinese and foreign companies such as ours, and as part of the process our Shanghai office was visited by the agency in the last 48 hours."

The spokesman added that the officials visiting UCB's office were from the State Administration for Industry and Commerce and were seeking information on compliance.

China's State Administration For Industry and Commerce is one of China's main three antitrust regulators in charge of market supervision. The investigations of the agency usually overlap with that in China's National Development and Reform Commission, and the latter was examining prices charged by 60 local and international drugmakers including units of GSK, Merck & Co, and Astellas Pharma following allegations.

UCB is short for Union Chimique Belge. It is a multinational biopharmaceutical manufacturing company headquartered in Brussels, Belgium. UCB was founded on January 18^th, 1928 by Emmanuel Janssen, a Belgian businessman. So far, the company has developed many notable drugs such as Atarax, Nootropli and Zyrtec.