Baxter names spinoff Baxalta

Baxter International Inc. picked the name Baxalta Inc. for the biopharmaceutical company it expects to spin off into a separate company next year.

“The naming of Baxalta is the latest milestone on our journey to becoming a separate, independent company,” Ludwig Hantson, president of Baxter BioScience, who will be chief executive officer of Baxalta, said in a news release.

The new company’s name draws on the Baxter name and a derivative of “altus,” which is Latin for “high” or “profound,” the company said Wednesday.

Baxalta will have about $6 billion in revenue and concentrate on treatments for rare conditions, chronic diseases and patients with limited treatment options. The company’s products will include treatments for hemophilia and other bleeding disorders and blood plasma therapies used to treat immune deficiencies and other problems.

Deerfield-based Baxter will keep the medical products business, including a portfolio of intravenous solutions and nutritional therapies, drug delivery systems, anesthetics and surgery products. It had 2013 revenue of more than $9 billion. The company says it is on track to complete the split in mid-2015.

Baxter says both companies will be headquartered in northern Illinois. The Baxter spinoff’s headquarters has been mentioned in connection with a Boston-area office complex development.

Shares of both companies are expected to trade on the New York Stock Exchange.