Union Chimique Belge

UCB S.A.

Type	Société anonyme
Traded as	Euronext: UCB
Industry	Pharmaceuticals
Founded	1928
Headquarters	Brussels, Belgium
Key people	Gerhard Mayr (Chairman), Jean Christophe Tellier (CEO)
Products	Biopharmaceuticals
Revenue	billion (2014)
Operating income	million
Profit	million (2010)
Number of employees	7,643 (end 2016)
Website	www.ucb.com

UCB (Union Chimique Belge) is a multinational biopharmaceutical company headquartered in Brussels, Belgium. UCB is an international company with a revenue of $3.876 billion in 2015 which focuses primarily on research and development, specifically involving medications centered on epilepsy, Parkinson's, and Crohn's diseases. The Company's efforts are focused on treatments for severe diseases treated by specialists, particularly in the fields of central nervous system (CNS) disorders (including epilepsy), inflammatory disorders (including allergy), and oncology.

Every three years, the company presents the UCB Award under the patronage of the Queen Elisabeth Medical Foundation to promote neuroscience research. The winner of this award is selected by an independent scientific committee.

UCB was founded on 18 January 1928 by Emmanuel Janssen, a Belgian businessman. Initially focused on industrial chemicals (it was one of the first companies to distill ammonia from coal), the company also included a small pharmaceutical division based around Meurice Laboratories.

In the early 1950s, UCB set up a research centre where new medicines such as Atarax (hydroxyzine) were developed. Successful sales enabled the pharmaceutical division to expand, and led to the discovery of another important compound, called piracetam. This was marketed in the 1970s as Nootropil and used to treat memory and balance problems. It remains one of UCB's key products. At this time, UCB was a company focusing on three core areas: pharmaceuticals, chemicals and films.

The success of Nootropil made it possible for UCB to build a modern pharmaceutical site in Braine-l'Alleud, south of Brussels. There, UCB developed Zyrtec (cetirizine), a blockbuster antihistamine. Other important products have followed including Keppra (levetiracetam), Xyzal (levocetirizine), and Cimzia (certolizumab pegol), which was acquired through the acquisition of Celltech.