Keyword: Novartis

Selling Shire’s legacy dry eye drug Xiidra to Novartis is one of several divestitures Takeda inked in 2019 to pare down the huge debt load incurred in its $59 billion takeover of the rare disease giant.

Novartis has agreed to buy The Medicines Company for $85 per share in a $9.7 billion cash transaction, a price that it might have overpaid. Though it’s buying the entire firm, the deal is really just about one drug: cardiovascular contender inclisiran.

Biopharma M&A got a big boost moneywise in 2019. The three largest delivered more than $150 billion, with Bristol-Myers Squibb's $74 billion takeover of Celgene setting a new record. Oncology was still a hot theme, stringing through a whole year of big dealmaking headlines, just as gene therapy gained popularity.