Another One Bites the Dust... Horizon Pharma Takes Out Bay Area's Raptor in $800 Million Deal
September 12, 2016
By Alex Keown, BioSpace.com Breaking News Staff
NOVATO, Calif.– Shares of Raptor Pharmaceutical Corp. are up nearly 20 percent in pre-market trading after Ireland-based Horizon Pharma announced it had struck a deal to acquire the rare disease company for $800 million.
Timothy Walbert, president and chief executive officer of Horizon, said the deal with Raptor strengthens the company’s commitment to expanding its rare disease pipeline. The company said bringing Raptor under its banner will diversify revenue “with 11 medicines across three business units: orphan, rheumatology and primary care.”
“Along with the potential for accelerated revenue growth, the addition of Raptor strengthens our U.S. orphan business and provides a platform to expand our orphan business in Europe and other key international markets. We look forward to working with new patient communities and building on the success of the Raptor team,” Walbert said in a statement.
The acquisition of Raptor brings its new cystic fibrosis drug Procysbi under the Horizon banner. Last year the company Raptor received regulatory approval for the expanded use of Procysbi (cysteamine bitartrate), the company’s delayed-release capsules used to treat children ages two to six with nephropathic cystinosis, a life-threatening metabolic lysosomal storage disorder that causes toxic accumulation of cystine in all cells, tissues, and organs in the body. Also last year the company acquired cystic fibrosis treatment Quinsair from Tripex Pharmaceuticals, the first inhaled fluoroquinolone approved in Europe for the management of chronic pulmonary infections in adults with cystic fibrosis. The company is seeking approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for Quinsair, another tool for Horizon.
Under terms of the deal, Horizon will acquire all outstanding shares of Raptor’s common stock for $9 per share. The stock closed at $7.45 per share on Friday, but is selling for $8.92 per share in premarket trading. Horizon said it will finance the deal through $675 million of external debt along with cash on hand. In its announcement, Horizon said it has $424.5 million of cash and cash equivalents on its balance sheet.
For the past few months, speculation has been running wild that Bay Area Raptor would be snapped up. In August there were unsubstantiated rumors that Retrophin Inc. , the company formerly helmed by Martin Shkreli, was looking to expand its treatments for rare diseases by acquiring Raptor. However, that deal was either never in the works, or it fell apart and Horizon swooped in with a better offer.
Raptor is one of numerous Bay Ara pharma companies snapped up in recent months. In May, Spain-based Grupo Ferrer Internacional, S.A. and its subsidiary Ferrer Pharma struck a deal to acquire Mountain View, Calif.-based Alexza Pharmaceuticals, Inc. for $35 million. In July, Swiss healthcare giant 229204 struck a $1.53 billion deal to acquire California-based Relypsa in order to strengthen its toehold in the United States as well as acquire the potassium binder Veltassa. One of the biggest acquisitions happened in August, with Pfizer ’s $14 billion deal to snap up Medivation and its late-stage prostate cancer drug, Xtandi, which earned more than $1 billion in 2015.