Sanofi Completes $2.5 Billion Synthorx Acquistion
Sanofi has completed its acquisition of US biotech Synthorx as planned for $68 per share in cash. This follows expiration of the French pharma giant’s tender offer for all of the outstanding shares of Synthorx’ common stock as scheduled on Jan. 22.
Total value of the cash offer announced in December 2019 and carried out by Sanofi’s Thunder Acquisition Corp. is about $2.5 billion.
Sanofi said all shares not validly tendered in the tender offer have been converted into the right to receive the same interest- and tax-free $68 per share as if they had been tendered.
Now that it is wholly owned by the Paris-based drugmaker, the company’s common stock has now ceased to be traded on the NASDAQ Global Select Stock Market.
“The acquisition of Synthorx perfectly aligns with our R&D strategy, enhancing our position as an emerging leader in the area of oncology and immunology,” said Sanofi CEO Paul Hudson.
Adding the La Jolla, California-based portfolio to its own will allow Sanofi to gain access to both great scientists and science as well as a powerful platform that complements its ongoing oncology and immunology research, the CEO noted.
The US company’s lead immuno-oncology product candidate, THOR-707, an engineered not-alpha IL-2 for the treatment of solid tumors, is in clinical development in multiple solid tumor types as a single agent and in combination with immune checkpoint inhibitors
Alone or in combination with other existing company platforms, including its own Nanobody technology, Sanofi said it expects Synthorx’s Genetic Alphabet platform to facilitate development of a wide range of novel biologics, including drug conjugates, protein fusions and multi-specific biologics, with applications beyond oncology and extending to other therapeutic areas.
