The animal health industry is increasingly receiving investment from Wall Street, according to Reuters.

"There is a lot of enthusiasm for animal health," said Tim Lugo, an analyst at William Blair & Company, which has helped manage two recent animal health stock initial public offerings. "Vets in general are starving for new innovative therapies."

Investors like the relative speed and inexpensiveness of animal drug development and testing, compared to drugs for humans. The human drug development and testing process can take 10 years and more than $1 billion, but animal drugs can be put on the market in five years at a cost of only $10 million, according to Reuters.

California-based Jaguar Animal Health, which launched a new calf anti-diarrhea drug at World Dairy Expo this year, filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission in August for a $70 million initial public offering, according to Reuters. The company is focused on animal applications of crofelemer, an anti-diarrhea drug approved for use in humans in 2012, according to IPOScoop.

Elsewhere, European drugmaker Novartis' sale of its animal health division to U.S.-based Eli Lilly for $5.4 billion was approved on Oct. 3 by EU regulators, according to Fierce Animal Health.

The global animal health industry's revenues are estimated between $92 billion and $102 billion, with the animal medicines and vaccines portion estimated at $22 billion annually, according to Reuters. The animal medicines and vaccines industry is expected to grow by 5.7 percent per year from 2011 to 2016. PD

—Summarized by Progressive Dairyman staff from cited sources