Takeda/ Millennium: The Price is Right

Takeda and Millennium's recent out-sized tie-up reflects the different but real industry pressures from which both companies are suffering.Facing near-term patent exiprations of several key drugs, Takeda desperately needed to bulk up its R&D pipeline. Millennium, for its own part, was heavily dependent on the label expansion of its lead product, Velcade, as it struggled to maintain sustainable earnings growth and advance its early stage compounds through the clinic.

On April 10, Takeda Pharmaceutical Co. Ltd. announced it had agreed to acquire Cambridge-based Takeda Oncology for $25 a share in an all-cash deal worth roughly $8.2 billion. [See Deal] If the deal terms remain the same, Millennium will make its exit with the eighth highest market value in the biotech industry, almost twice as much as the next ones in line, Cephalon Inc., ImClone Systems Inc., and Vertex Pharmaceuticals Inc. That’s not bad for a company with just one marketed product and fewer than a dozen promising, but still risky, clinical assets.

Details of the deal were still emerging as IN VIVO went to press, but the out-sized price for the tie-up...

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