GlaxoSmithKline will take its $2.6 billion (€2 billion) bid for long-time partner Human Genome Sciences directly to shareholders this week, after its takeover offer was rejected last month by the US biotech group’s board.
The decision to go hostile with the $13-a-share cash tender offer sets GSK up for a potentially lengthy battle with those Human Genome investors who believe it is not offering enough.
“They will do fantastically well out of this – at $13 it is a steal,” said Mark Evans, a fund manager at Taube Hodson Stonex, the sixth largest investor in Human Genome with a 5.6 per cent stake. “I still think it is very likely that they will have to pay more.”
GSK and the US pioneer of gene-based drug discovery together sell Benlysta, a new drug for the auto-immune condition lupus, and they are collaborating on two other experimental drugs for diabetes and heart disease.
Buying Human Genome would give GSK full rights to these partnered drugs, underscoring the appetite among big drugmakers for biotech products to refill their medicine chests. – (Reuters)
