Nestle SA has acquired CM&D Pharma, a UK-based drug-maker start-up testing a chewing gum to help kidney-disease sufferers, the first move in the company’s effort to build a business selling food products that targets diseases.

“Nestle SA has acquired a UK-based pharmaceutical start-up testing a chewing gum to help kidney-disease sufferers,” The Wall Street Journal reported.

Switzerland-based Nestle has significant presence in India and operates through its subsidiary Nestle India in the country.

Nestle’s deal for CM&D Pharma Ltd, to be announced today, is likely the first of many for Nestle Health Science SA, a subsidiary that opened its doors last month, the report noted.

According to the publication, Nestle confirmed that it had made the deal but did not disclose terms.

In September, Nestle said it would create the Health Science subsidiary and invest $534 million over 10 years in a sister research institute.

CM&D was started in 2007 by former Sinclair Pharma PLC executive Danilo Massari. Though the company has yet to fully launch any products, it has a number of medical foods in trials.

So far, much of Nestle Health Science is made up of the medical nutrition business that the Swiss foods giant acquired from Novartis AG for $2.5 billion in 2007. It is that division that markets the Boost energy shakes.

Nestle, which has annual sales of more than $100 billion, had been an investor in CM&D through Inventages Venture Capital Investments before buying it.

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