Deals in Depth: January 2009

Executive Summary

January 2009 dealmaking highlights: Big Pharma consolidation is back in the news as one of the largest mega-mergers in history took place in January with Pfizer's acquisition of Wyeth for $67bn. Abbott topped the list on the device side, leaping into the vision care field with its $2.8bn purchase of Advanced Medical Optics. Meanwhile financing--mainly from private placements--for both the drug and device industries was up from the previous month, and notably pharma showed a 4x increase in private investor funding.