Deal Statistics Quarterly, Q4 2004
Executive Summary
In this issue, we present another installment of our quarterly review of dealmaking-for October-December 2004. Our data comes from Windhover's Strategic Transactions Database, which covers deal activity within the pharmaceutical/biotechnology, medical device, and in vitro diagnostics industries.
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Elephant Cha-Cha: The J&J/Guidant Deal
If you want some sense of the magnitude of Johnson & Johnson's recently announced acquisition of Guidant Corp., consider this: the $25.4 billion price tag was more than six times larger than any other deal done in the medical device space over the past six years; Still, if device industry executives were amazed by the deal, they weren't surprised. J&J's play for Guidant had been rumored for years-driven, it was argued, by a logical desire on the part of J&J to build on a valuable cardiovascular device business by accessing a major cardiac rhythm management (CRM) business. But it was the vascular business of both companies that seemed to propel the merger beyond the talking stages, beginning most notably, with the deal J&J and Guidant signed earlier this year to co-promote Cordis' Cypher drug-eluting stent. However, for all of the promise implicit in the merger of these two giants, there are enormous integration issues to be addressed, both before and after the deal closes. And for now, precisely how these challenges are resolved is likely to be fraught with uncertainty.
Yamanouchi/Fujisawa Merger: Closing Japanese Options
The Yamanouchi/Fujisawa acquisition may be the most important transaction to have occured in Japan in decades--or will be if it goes through. One key element: the deal ends important merger options for mid-size Japanese companies, who had more or less closed off transaction possibilities with Western companies at least partly in the hope of being able to do an intra-Japan deal. Now the Western firms have decided to build their own Japanese infrastructure, leaving the mid-sized firms without the strategic flexibility they once thought they had.
Building A US Business: Celltrion’s New CCO Talks Strategy
With Celltrion transitioning to a direct sales model in the US after previously partnering with other firms to market its biosimilars, the company’s new US chief commercial officer, Tom Nusbickel, talks to Generics Bulletin about how the firm is gearing up to launch three key products.