Gilead is actively looking for late-stage and de-risked assets for potential deals across various therapeutic spaces, including liver disease, cancer and immunology.
Gilead will stay on the lookout for dealmaking opportunities across a wide range of therapeutic fields, CFO Andrew Dickinson told investors during the pharma’s Q3 earnings call on Thursday.
“We are actively looking at opportunities across the [business development] spectrum in all our areas of strategic interests,” Dickinson said. “That includes liver diseases.” In February 2024, Gilead made a $4.3 billion play to acquire CymaBay, a deal anchored by the biotech’s liver disease drug seladelpar. A few months later, the bet paid off when the FDA cleared the drug for primary biliary cholangitis, for which it is marketed as Livdelzi.
“We would like to add more therapies just like Livdelzi,” Dickinson said, noting that the pharma is consistently searching for “best-in-class therapies that serve patients.” In particular, Gilead is looking to add “late-stage derisked assets” at a pace of “every two to three years at a minimum,” he continued.
Aside from liver diseases, Gilead is also actively scouting for potential deals in oncology, virology, immunology and cell therapy, Dickinson said.
Gilead has yet to report exact sales figures for Livdelzi, but has previously said that the drug has proven to be a valuable asset. In a statement accompanying the pharma’s second quarter report, CEO Daniel O’Day named Livdelzi as one of the biggest contributors to the company’s “strong growth.”
O’Day sang a similar tune on Thursday’s call, touting 35% “sequential growth” for Livdelzi, which he said led to the “commercial outperformance” of the pharma’s liver disease franchise. Gilead’s hepatology line made $819 million in Q3, up from $733 million during the same period last year.
Across its business, Gilead recorded a 3% year-on-year increase for $7.8 billion in revenue. Product sales, on the other hand, dipped 2% to $7.3 billion, coming 1% under the consensus estimate. This dip was driven, according to analysts at BMO Capital Markets, by “more pronounced demand declines in cell-therapy.” Earnings of the CAR T therapies Yescarta and Tecartus fell 12% and 10%, respectively, below expectations, according to BMO.
Also contributing to Gilead’s mixed Q3 was the COVID-19 drug Veklury, which crashed 60% year-over-year to $277 million. BMO noted the miss, which fell 24% below consensus estimates, and said that COVID product sales could shift to the fourth quarter, where the infection cycle is expected to be later this year. HIV remained Gilead’s strongest franchise, with sales ticking up 4% year-over-year to bring in $5.27 billion and beat forecasts by 1%. The pharma’s top-performing asset was the daily HIV pill Biktarvy, which grew 6% to make nearly $3.7 billion.
The recently approved twice-yearly pre-exposure prophylaxis Yeztugo commanded a lot of attention during the call. The drug made $39 million in its first commercial quarter, racking up $54 million in total since landing on the market. Gilead expects uptake to pick up in the coming quarters, with full-year sales hitting “around $150 million or so,” Chief Commercial Officer Johanna Mercier said.
Overall, Gilead narrowed its 2025 forecast. The pharma now expects to hit $28.4 billion to $28.7 billion in full-year product sales, up from previous guidance of $28.3 billion to $28.7 billion.
