Catalyst Pharmaceuticals comes with a trio of approved drugs as Angelini Pharma expands its neuroscience offerings.
Angelini Pharma is putting up $4.1 billion in a play for Catalyst Pharmaceuticals, scooping up three rare disease drugs that will allow the Italian company to enter the U.S. market.
Angelini believes the buyout will establish the company as “a relevant global player in neurological rare diseases,” CEO Sergio Marullo di Condojanni said in a Thursday announcement.
Created in 2002, Florida-based Catalyst Pharmaceuticals now touts several marketed drugs, including Firdapse, the only FDA-approved treatment for a rare autoimmune disease called Lambert-Eaton myasthenic syndrome (LEMS). In 2025, full product revenue for the potassium channel blocker was $358.4 million, marking 17.1% yearly growth.
Firdapse had been the focus of a patent spat between Catalyst and Hetero USA after the latter requested approval to market a generic version of the drug before Catalyst’s patents expired. The case was headed to a jury but Catalyst announced today that a settlement had been reached, a move that will resolve all pending litigation.
With its purchase, Angelini will also get Catalyst’s Duchenne muscular dystrophy treatment Agamree, a corticosteroid that secured FDA approval in 2023 for patients two years and older. Finally, the acquisition includes Fycompa, an antiepileptic injection for which Catalyst gained U.S. rights in 2022 from Eisai.
Angelini plans to pay $31.50 per Catalyst share, representing a 28% premium to the biotech’s average 30-day trading price as of April 22. The deal is expected to close in the third quarter of this year.
The Italian pharmaceutical intends on incorporating Catalyst’s portfolio and commercial infrastructure into its Brain Health division, with the ultimate goal of creating a next-gen therapeutic platform for rare diseases, according to Angelini.
“By combining our unique capabilities in rare diseases with Angelini’s proven global reach, we will create a stronger, scalable, and robust rare disease platform to expand access to life-changing therapies worldwide,” Catalyst CEO Rich Daly said in a statement.
In recent years, Angelini has bolstered its neuro pipeline through numerous partnerships, including deals with Grin Therapeutics, Sovargen and Quiver Bioscience.
The Catalyst buyout comes on the heels of another major M&A play made by an Italian company. At the end of April, Chiesi Group paid $1.9 billion to pick up KalVista Pharmaceuticals and its hereditary angioedema treatment Ekterly.
