Deals

Gemini’s fall gives Disc a way around biotech’s IPO slump

The biotech’s failed attempt to develop an eye drug has ended in a reverse merger that gives startup Disc Medicine a fast path to the public markets.

By Gwendolyn Wu • Aug. 10, 2022

A biotech startup gives Merck its next shot at treating Alzheimer’s

Boston-based Cerevance is searching for new drug targets for neurological diseases like Alzheimer’s, although CEO Craig Thompson wouldn’t reveal what its work with Merck will take aim at.

By Gwendolyn Wu • Aug. 9, 2022

Pfizer buys sickle cell drugmaker Global Blood for $5.4B

The acquisition gives Pfizer access to Oxbryta, an approved drug for the blood condition, as well as two experimental medicines.

By Delilah Alvarado , Ned Pagliarulo • Updated Aug. 8, 2022

How a small UK biotech ended up in Gilead’s hands

MiroBio, which was spun out of the University of Oxford three years ago, drew Gilead’s interest with its autoimmune disease research.

By Gwendolyn Wu • Aug. 5, 2022

Amgen bets almost $4B on a biotech and its inflammation drugs

The deals hands Amgen a few clinical programs and a marketed therapy in Tavneos, which was approved last year to treat a group of autoimmune diseases.

By Jacob Bell • Aug. 4, 2022

AbCellera inks another venture partnership, this time with Atlas

One week after striking a deal with Versant, the antibody specialist is teaming up with Atlas to provide drug candidates to an undisclosed startup backed by the biotech investor.

By Delilah Alvarado • Aug. 3, 2022

AbbVie, targeting a well-known protein family, expands a partnership into neuroscience

It’s the second deal in as many years between AbbVie and Sosei Heptares, which together have been trying to develop drugs that target so-called G protein-coupled receptors.

By Jacob Bell • Aug. 2, 2022

Ipsen, continuing oncology push, pays a startup $45M for two cancer drugs

The French company will work with Marengo Therapeutics in an alliance that could be worth as much as $1.6 billion.

By Delilah Alvarado • Aug. 1, 2022

US secures updated COVID boosters in $1.7B deal with Moderna

Health officials are gearing up for a fall vaccination campaign and aim to deploy shots modified to better match circulating omicron subvariants.

By Delilah Alvarado • July 29, 2022

Vertex, Verve team up to develop a gene editing drug for liver disease

The deal, which is worth $60 million upfront, broadens Vertex’s reach into gene editing and expands Verve’s research beyond heart disease.

By Ben Fidler • July 20, 2022

AbbVie, building eye-care business, pays $60M for implantable glaucoma treatment

The pharma has secured an option to buy iSTAR Medical, which sells a small implant that helps lower eye pressure and is cleared for use in Europe.

By Elise Reuter • July 20, 2022

Nestlé expands microbiome drug work with biotech deal

The food giant will pay French company Enterome about $40 million to join in the development of an inflammatory bowel disease drug as well as other food allergy treatments.

By Delilah Alvarado • July 18, 2022

Ultragenyx sells rare disease drug royalties to Canadian pension fund

In exchange for $500 million, the fund, called OMERS, will get a 30% royalty on future sales of Ultragenyx’s drug Crysvita in the U.S. and Canada, where it’s approved to treat two rare conditions.

By Jacob Bell • July 15, 2022

Royalty Pharma buys rights to top-selling GSK drug in pair of deals

The prolific biopharma dealmaker is paying Theravance $1.1 billion and Innoviva $282 million to acquire rights to royalties on GSK’s asthma and COPD drug Trelegy Ellipta.

By Kristin Jensen • July 14, 2022

TherapeuticsMD buyout unravels as shareholders balk

Too few investors in the women’s health company pledged their shares to the take-private offer from EW Healthcare Partners, killing the deal.

By Delilah Alvarado • July 13, 2022

Vertex acquires another maker of potentially curative diabetes treatments

For $320 million, Vertex said it plans to buy ViaCyte in a deal that would provide “complementary assets, capabilities and technologies” to the ones it picked up through the 2019 acquisition of Semma Therapeutics.

By Jacob Bell • July 11, 2022

Healthcare asset manager Innoviva buys another biotech at a bargain price

Two months after acquiring Entasis Therapeutics, the firm reached a deal to buy La Jolla Pharmaceutical Co. at a fraction of what La Jolla was worth just a few years ago.

By Jonathan Gardner • July 11, 2022

ADC Therapeutics cuts deal with Sobi to broaden reach of cancer drug

The alliance comes on the heels of a change in leadership at ADC and will help ready the biotech to launch its lymphoma drug in Europe.

By Delilah Alvarado • July 8, 2022

AbbVie dials back partnership on experimental Alzheimer's drug

While AbbVie is bailing on one of the two programs it paid Alector $205 million to acquire five years ago, work will continue on the second project. That drug, however, has shown safety signals.  

By Jonathan Gardner • July 8, 2022

Radius, fending off activists, outlines pitch for $890 million buyout

The biotech detailed the process that led to its take-private offer last month, aiming to win the support of shareholders, including two firms that have pushed for change. 

By Ben Fidler • July 8, 2022

After a lengthy drought, could biotech M&A be on the upswing?

With at least 14 buyouts worth $50 million or more, the second quarter was one of the busiest three-month periods for acquisitions in recent years. Some industry watchers expect that pace to continue. 

By Jacob Bell • July 8, 2022

As Merck closes in on Seagen, the FTC nears a key test on pharma deals

An acquisition reportedly worth $40 billion or more and potentially signed within weeks could draw notable scrutiny from regulators and force the companies to divest certain drug programs.  

By Jonathan Gardner , Ben Fidler • July 7, 2022

Two cancer biotechs merge, raise cash as sector-wide downturn continues

Syros Pharmaceuticals and Tyme Technologies, shares of which trade near all-time lows, will combine and raise about $130 million in the latest example of how the industry’s slump is affecting publicly traded biotechs. 

By Delilah Alvarado • July 5, 2022

CureVac sues rival COVID-19 vaccine maker BioNTech for patent infringement

The biotech, whose own efforts to develop a COVID-19 vaccine have faltered, claims its inventions were crucial to the development of BioNTech’s top-selling coronavirus shot.

By Jonathan Gardner • July 5, 2022

With $100M AstraZeneca deal, a biotech and its investors engineer another buyout

An entity originally known as Teneobio has now been the focus of three acquisition deals with large pharmaceutical companies since 2021, capitalizing on the industry’s growing interest in dual-acting antibody drugs.

By Ben Fidler • July 5, 2022