When Japanese doctors Ryuji Ueno and Sachiko Kuno came to Bethesda two decades ago, they already had a drug company back home. They founded what would become Sucampo entirely with their own capital in 1996 to see if they could sell treatments to a much larger American market.
Two decades later Sucampo is under new leadership, and is buying out its Japanese predecessor R-Tech Ueno for $278 million in cash and stock.