Tokyo/New Delhi - Japan's pharmaceutical Daiichi Sankyo Co reached an agreement with India's Ranbaxy Laboratories to acquire a majority stake, the Japanese company announced Wednesday.

The acquisition was estimated to be worth between 3.4 and 4.6 billion dollars.

Daiichi Sankyo intends to boost cost competitiveness in effective use of manufacturing as well as research and development facilities, especially in India, through the acquisition, the company said.

"While both companies will closely cooperate to explore how to fully optimize our growth opportunities, we will respect Ranbaxy's autonomy as a standalone company as well," Daiichi Sankyo Co President & CEO Takashi Shoda said in a statement.

Tokyo - Japan's opposition parties were expected to submit a non-binding censure motion against Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda in the House of Councillors Wednesday afternoon.

The motion was likely to pass the opposition-controlled upper house, which would make Fukuda the first Japanese prime minister in postwar Japan to face a censure motion passage in the upper house.

The main opposition Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) and Social Democratic Party (SDP) are submitting the censure motion because the ruling Liberal Democratic Party and its coalition the New Komeito Party refused to abolish a health-care insurance programme for those aged 75 and up.

Tokyo  - Japan's April current account surplus made the largest fall in more than five years due to increasing imports, the Finance Ministry said Wednesday.

Tokyo  - Japan's key Nikkei 225 Stock Average opened moderately higher in mixed-trading Wednesday as investors bought back shares on the US dollar's advance against the yen.

Tokyo  - The Japanese economy grew more strongly than expected in the first quarter of 2008 after the government corrected its original annual growth figure for the world's second largest national

Taipei  - Taiwan Tuesday expressed grave concern over the Japanese coast