Eli Lilly to acquire CoLucid Pharmaceuticals for $960m
Staff Writer |
Eli Lilly and Company and CoLucid Pharmaceuticals announced an agreement for Lilly to acquire CoLucid for $46.50 per share or approximately $960 million.
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This all-cash transaction will enhance Lilly’s existing portfolio in pain management for migraine, while adding a potential near-term launch to its late-stage pipeline.
CoLucid Pharmaceuticals is a public biopharmaceutical company developing an oral 5-HT1F agonist (lasmiditan) for the acute treatment of migraine. CoLucid has completed the first of two pivotal Phase 3 trials.
A data read-out for the second Phase 3 trial, SPARTAN, is expected in the second half of 2017. If this trial is positive, submission of lasmiditan for U.S. regulatory approval could occur in 2018.
More than 36 million people suffer from migraine in the United States alone. Lasmiditan, if approved, would be a first-in-class therapy to treat migraine through a novel mechanism of action without vasoconstriction.
This could be desirable in migraine patients who have, or are at risk for, cardiovascular disease, as well as those who are dissatisfied with their current therapies.
Lasmiditan is an important addition to Lilly’s emerging pain management pipeline, which includes galcanezumab, a potential medicine in Phase 3 clinical development for the prevention of migraine and cluster headache.
In addition, tanezumab is being studied, in collaboration with Pfizer, for the treatment of multiple pain indications, including osteoarthritis, lower back and cancer pain.
Under the terms of the agreement, Lilly will acquire all shares of CoLucid Pharmaceuticals for a purchase price of $46.50 per share or approximately $960 million. The transaction is expected to close by the end of the first quarter of 2017, subject to clearance under the Hart-Scott-Rodino Antitrust Improvements Act and other customary closing conditions.
While the financial charge will not be finalized until after completion of the acquisition, Lilly is expecting to recognize a financial charge of approximately $850 million (no tax benefit), or approximately $0.80 per share, as an acquired in-process research and development charge to earnings in the first quarter of 2017.
The company’s reported earnings per share guidance in 2017 is expected to be reduced by the amount of the charge. There will be no change to the company’s non-GAAP earnings per share guidance as a result of this transaction. ■