Syntex Pharmaceuticals

Pharmaceutical company founded in Mexico City in 1944 and later headquartered in Palo Alto, California, which became known for the first synthesis of steroid hormones from Mexican yam and for the oral contraceptive pill, and later for the anti inflammatory naproxen sold as Naprosyn and Anaprox. Roche acquired the company in 1994 in a deal valued at around five billion dollars, renamed its research arm Roche Bioscience and absorbed its products and pipeline.