Pharma Takeover : Novartis International Has Reached $9.7 billion deal to buy Cholesterol DrugMaker, Medicines Company

Novartis International AG, a Swiss multinational pharmaceutical company based in Basel, Switzerland, is one of the largest pharmaceutical companies by both market capitalization and sales; has agreed to take over the US cholesterol drugmaker, The Medicines Company for a whole $9.7 billion. This brings the company stock to be valued at $85 per share.

This takeover is the first attempt by Vas Narasimhan, Novartis Chief Executive, to reshape the Swiss pharmaceutical company, which has a market value of $203bn.

The pharmaceutical giant announced on Sunday that it was acquiring the company at $9.7 billion, with a goal of boosting its cardiovascular treatment investing portfolio. Vas Narasimhan said it will place hands-on the promising "potential transformational medicine", Inclisiran, which recently completed its third phase study and fights "bad" LDL cholesterol in patients with atherosclerosis.

If the sale is completed, Inclisiran will be added to Novartis's current cardiovascular products, after the success of its heart-failure treatment, Entresto which soared at 61% all-year-round to $430 million during the third quarter of 2019.

Novartis plans to pay for the acquisition with "available cash and short- and long-term borrowings". The deal is expected to be finalized in the first quarter of 2020.

 Novartis Share Price

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  91.50CHF

  as of Nov 26, 17:31 CET

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  as of Nov 26, 16:02 EST

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