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sought new products by acquisition and his own research, both in Australia and overseas, albeit on a scale far too small by the standards
of the international pharmaceutical business. When Aspro’s star began
to fade and the scale of international R & D eluded Nicholas’ resources more and more, he sought innovation at the fringe: Novel packaging
in cheap, small and water proof packages (Sanitape), roll compression tablets, excursions into vitamins (Aktavite) and even chemically simple prescription drugs, Megimide and Daptazole, derived from work by Professor FW Shaw at Melbourne University; these however, fell far short of being major drugs.
There were some other avenues
to broadening the market,
veterinary drugs and formulation
of imported drugs. Already in the 1940s Nicholas’ had established a development department; in 1955
it added a research department in
the Dandenongs near Melbourne which ran until well into the 1970s and similar smaller establishments overseas. The animal market in Australia was much larger than the human pharmaceutical market. Yet it too depended on a succession of new drugs and faced fierce international competition. The CSIRO helped
to some extent. In 1955 Hedley Marston’s team (CSIRO) found that traces of cobalt cured coast disease and phalaris staggers in sheep. The CSIRO developed slow release
‘cobalt bullets’. However, the local
market was small and fragmented
by CSIRO’s policy of non-exclusive, wide licensing, and the product was a failure overseas.
Nicholas persisted with its research department and veterinary work for some years, but as time progressed
the entrance fee into the core pharmaceutical business, the discovery of a major new drug per se, increased and the gap between target and resources became wider and wider.
To cope with this Nicholas had gone public in the UK in 1937, and in 1971 reunited its Australian and overseas businesses in Melbourne. Two ambitious attempts to forge links to international producers with major R & D strength – a joint company overseas with Pfizer and an approach to Parke Davis – failed, perhaps because of the disparity of resources.
An important facet of the story is Nicholas’ impact on the chemical industry itself. In 1928 the Nicholas
family together with Monsanto founded Monsanto Southern Cross. The manufacture of salicylates in due course stimulated the local production of phenol, phenacetin and acetanilide by this company (1940) and, after
the separation of the Nicholas and Monsanto interests in 1941, led to the formation of one of the pioneering chemical companies in Australia, Monsanto Chemicals Australia Ltd. Nicholas’ historical significance is
that it was one of the first Australian multinational companies.
It recognised the key elements: innovation, marketing and international operation, but could never quite raise enough resources
to break the last barrier in R&D
– continuity of discovery of basic new drugs.
The attitude of public sector research and Government policies played
an important role, or, rather, failed
to play a positive role. Academics
and the CSIRO helped but never
saw Nicholas, or any other single company, as a vehicle to a national pharmaceutical industry, although, throughout the years, substantial public funds were spent in the medico-pharmaceutical and biological areas.
References
• Australian Science and Technology Heritage Centre, using the Web Academic Resource Publisher at www.austehc.unimelb.edu. au/tia/623.html
• Grenville Smith R, Barrie A. Aspro – How a Family Business Grew Up. Nicholas International Ltd.,1976.
 ■ Pharmacy History Australia
volume 3 ■ no 32 ■ JULY 2007
The residence of Nicholas, the “Aspro” King of Toorak”