Biotech M&A is picking back up. Here are the latest deals.
In the business of drug development, deals can be just as important as scientific breakthroughs. Many of today's most influential medicines, from the life-saving cancer treatment Keytruda to the anti-inflammatory agent Enbrel, might not have become so without mergers and acquisitions.
Over the last few years, pharmaceutical M&A hit record highs as larger companies turned again and again to young biotechs for innovation. Often, these deals focused on cancer, rare diseases and immune system disorders — areas of drug research that were seeing major victories in clinical trials and huge profits for treatments that made it to market.
These deals haven’t come cheap, however, with premiums on biopharma acquisitions surpassing 100% many times in recent years. Such high prices have been due, at least in part, to the fact that biotechs were able to secure large amounts of funding from private investors and the public markets, in turn forcing potential buyers to offer up more money to lock down deals.
While M&A was plentiful in 2018 and 2019, and even held up during a year gripped by the onset of the pandemic, 2021 and 2022 were much quieter. Analysts and other industry watchers have been forecasting a rebound for some time, but that has yet to materialize. Some have argued that's due to both new challenges and, perhaps, changing attitudes of would-be buyers.
Whether M&A activity increases will have a significant effect on which startups and drug programs get funded and advanced.BioPharma Dive is tracking these deals below. The database, which shows drugmaker acquisitions that happened since 2018 and were valued at $50 million or more in upfront consideration, will be regularly updated.
Click on an acquiring company to pull up more information, and scroll to the bottom of the page to read how this information was collected and organized. If there's anything we've missed, or any additional information you'd like to see, please reach out and let us know.
Editor's note: If tables or values do not display, please try clearing your browser's cache and reloading the page.
Z
A
Biotech acquisitions, by year and total value paid upfront
Biotech acquisitions, by year and percent premium paid
Biotech acquisitions, by year and therapeutic category
Methodology
For this database, BioPharma Dive looked only at companies developing human medicines. The mergers and acquisitions included in the database are limited by certain criteria, namely that they must be for an entire company — not for product licensings, options to acquire or for partial equity stakes.
Additionally, the database is limited to deals valued at a minimum of $50 million upfront. Total consideration can reflect both cash and equity offered upfront in exchange for the acquired company’s shares, but deals in which the upfront payment was not specified, or was less than $50 million, were not included.
Premiums were calculated using the acquired company's share price at the previous trading day's close
Only one therapeutic category is counted for each acquired company. For those with multiple focuses, the chosen therapeutic area is based on lead asset or, lacking one that's distinctly identified, the company is classified under "other."
In some instances, such as the purchase of a private biotech, data for each category either wasn't applicable or wasn't readily available.
