Britain’s AstraZeneca to buy US pharma firm for $39b

Shareholders of Alexion will receive $60 in cash, $115 worth of equity per share

FRANKFURT:

Britain’s AstraZeneca has agreed to buy US drugmaker Alexion Pharmaceuticals for $39 billion in its largest-ever deal to bolster its positions in immunology and rare diseases.

The deal comes in a week that AstraZeneca said it was conducting further research to confirm whether its Covid-19 vaccine could be 90% effective, potentially slowing its rollout, and as a rival shot from Pfizer was launched in Britain and approved for use in the United States.

The British company said on Saturday that Alexion shareholders would receive $60 in cash and about $115 worth of equity per share - either in AstraZeneca’s UK-traded ordinary shares or in dollar-denominated American Depositary Shares.

Based on a reference average ADR price of $54.14, it implies a total price of $175 per share. Alexion shares closed at around $121 apiece on Friday.

“It is a tremendous opportunity for us to accelerate our development in immunology, getting into a new segment of disease, a new segment of physicians and patients we haven’t been able to cover so far,” AstraZeneca Chief Executive Pascal Soriot told a media call.

The British firm said the boards of both companies had approved the deal which, subject to regulatory and shareholder approval, is expected to close in the third quarter of 2021.

AstraZeneca was once seen as leading the race to develop a Covid-19 vaccine, but has fallen behind Pfizer and its partner BioNTech, as well as Moderna, whose shots have shown greater efficacy in late-stage clinical trials.

Alexion generates billions in cash from its rare disease treatments and sells one of the costliest drugs in the world - rare blood disease treatment Soliris - which can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars per patient.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 13^th, 2020.

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