Shares of Amgen Inc. fell 1.0% in premarket trading Monday after the biotechnology company said it agreed to buy Celgene Corp.’s psoriasis treatment Otezla for $13.4 billion in cash.
Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. said the previously announced decision to Otezla was part of the regulatory approval process for the pending acquisition of Celgene. Shares of Celgene surged 3.7% in premarket trading and Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. shot up 5.2%. Amgen said the deal will immediately add to adjusted earnings per share, and will not interrupt the deployment of its capital allocation priorities.
“The acquisition of Otezla offers a unique opportunity for Amgen to provide patients an innovative oral therapy for psoriasis and psoriatic arthritis that fits squarely within our portfolio and complements our Enbrel(R) and AMGEVITA(R) brands,” said Amgen Chief Executive Robert Bradway.
Amgen’s stock has gained 2.3% year to date while the Dow Jones Industrial Average rallied 9.9%.
By Tomi Kilgore
Source: MarketWatch
A monkeypox outbreak is emerging in the U.S. and Europe, and at least one country is amping up countermeasure preparedness. Bavarian Nordic has secured a contract with an unnamed European country to supply its smallpox vaccine, called Imvanex in Europe, in response to the emergence of monkeypox cases, the Danish company said Thursday.
Moderna’s recent chief financial officer debacle—in which Jorge Gomez departed on his second day on the job—raised questions about the company’s hiring process given its rush to global biopharma prominence. The most obvious one: How was it possible for Gomez to be hired when he was under investigation by his previous employer, Dentsply Sirona of Charlotte, N.C.
Merck & Co. is plucking a cancer project from the branch of Chinese-based Kelun Pharmaceutical for up to $1.4 billion, but details from the New Jersey-based Big Pharma have been hard to come by. The deal, first disclosed Monday on the Shenzhen stock exchange, has Merck handing over $47 million in upfront cash in exchange for ex-China rights to a “macromolecular tumor project.”
