Basic Information
Byk Gulden Lomberg Chemical Factory GmbH, a German pharmaceutical company and wholly-owned subsidiary of Altana AG, is headquartered in Konstanz.The company was founded in 1873 by Heinrich Byk in Berlin under the name "Dr. Heinrich Byk." The first product was a synthetic sleep aid called Chloralum hydratum, which can be traced back to Justus von Liebig and Oscar Liebreich. In 1915, after Byk transferred his responsibilities to the chemist Paul Gulden, the company was renamed Byk Gulden. In 1941, under Günther Quandt's leadership, Accumulatoren Fabrik AG (AFA) acquired the majority of the company’s shares. In 2002, Byk Gulden was renamed Altana Pharma AG. In June 2007, Altana's pharmaceutical division was sold to the Danish Nycomed Group and has since operated under the name Nycomed GmbH. This was taken over by Takeda in 2011, and the pharmaceutical company continues to own the company today.