NEW YORK -- China's Simcere Pharmaceutical Group inked a deal with Merck & Co Thursday to form a joint venture, aiming at serving China's rapidly expanding health care needs.

The strategic partnership will merge extensive resources and expertise of a global health care company and a leading Chinese pharmaceutical company in support of their goals in development, registration, manufacturing and sales capabilities, according to the agreement.

Their initial focus will be branded pharmaceutical products for cardiovascular and metabolic diseases.

Merck is proud to partner with Simcere and is committed to enhancing health care in China. The innovative partnership steps up Merck's business expansion, and also tallies with Chinese government's effort to facilitate the access to quality medicines, president of Merck's Global Human Health said at the signing ceremony in New Jersey.

The agreement marks another "milestone" in the company's history and seeks to address enormous challenges of the Chinese health care system and to meet the needs of Chinese patients and health care stakeholders, said Jinsheng Ren, chairman and CEO of Simcere.

Simcere Pharmaceutical Group, founded in 1995, is China's leading pharmaceutical company specializing in development, manufacturing and marketing of branded generic and proprietary pharmaceutical, and is dedicated to the treatment of diseases with high incidence and/or mortality rates.