RE:RE:RE:RE:RE:RE:Biotech industry readies for " Pharma M&A Spree"
December 11, 2024 - Financial Times - “Big pharma ate through a lot of the available targets in 2023,” said Jamie Leigh, co-chair of Cooley’s mergers and acquisitions group. “[Companies were] more judicious about the remaining pool in 2024.”
Some bigger deals have been completed this year but none were instances in which a pharma group was buying a biotech to get hold of promising drugs. Novo Nordisk this year agreed to pay $11bn to acquire three manufacturing sites from Catalent in a three-way deal involving its parent company, while Sanofi handed control of its consumer drug division to private equity group Clayton Dubilier & Rice in a €16bn deal.
A tough antitrust environment under Lina Khan’s Federal Trade Commission as well as the political uncertainty of an election year has also slowed deal activity. But the election of Donald Trump could usher in the return of bigger healthcare tie-ups.
“Trump coming to power is generating cautious optimism for increased deal flow and investments in the biopharma sector” said Zahid Moneer, a senior managing director of healthcare at BNP Paribas. ‘There’s a cautious buzz around that in January you will see a significant rebound in activity.”
For the time being, pharma companies have prioritised bolt-on deals of below $5bn, favouring private companies over listed groups. Please use the sharing tools found via the share button at the top or side of articles.
Siddhart Nahata, global head of healthcare investment banking at Morgan Stanley, said: “Bolt-ons are business as usual — large-cap [pharma groups] have had to keep doing bolt-ons to supplement their internal R&D efforts. There’s no way around that.”