Botox maker draws bid
NEW YORK, USA
VALEANT Pharmaceuticals is teaming up with activist investor Bill Ackman in a bid for Botox maker Allergan that could be worth about US$40 billion.
Valeant said Monday that it intends to propose a merger with Allergan using a combination of Valeant stock and cash. The transaction size has not been disclosed, but Valeant expects the cash portion of the deal to be at least US$15 billion.
Allergan said it had no comment on the bid late Monday.
In a separate filing, Ackman’s Pershing Square Capital Management said it owns a 9.7 per cent stake in Allergan worth US$4.1 billion. Ackman’s stake would make an Allergan deal worth around US$40 billion.
Valeant Pharmaceuticals International Inc. is one of Canada’s largest pharmaceutical companies, with revenue of US$5.8 billion last year. The company, headquartered in Laval, Quebec, has pursued an aggressive acquisition strategy. It’s racked up more than 50 deals since 2008.
Last August, it completed an US$8.7 billion acquisition of Bausch + Lomb, giving it a major stake in the market for contact lenses, eye drugs and eye surgical devices. Before that, the company’s largest deals included a US$1.65 billion tie-up with Biovail Corp. in 2010, and its US$2.6 billion acquisition of dermatology products maker Medicis Pharma in December 2012.
Allergan, which is based in Irvine, California, has long been one of the star performers in the specialty pharmaceutical sector. “Specialty pharmaceutical” is an industry term that differentiates smaller drugmakers from much bigger companies that sell a wide array of drugs, such as Pfizer and Merck.