June Healthcare M&A Eclipses Recent Biotech IPO Surge

Recent $500M surge in Biotech IPOs is eclipsed by June healthcare M&A activity measured in Multi-Billions

By: Ellen Baron, PhD and Oded Ben-Joseph, PhD, MBA

Outcome Capital

Big guns may have been fired up this week in the financing world with 6 of 12 Biotech IPOs debuting and raising more than $460M dollars.

This figure however is dwarfed by the value of Merger & Acquisitions announced or offers made within healthcare during June to date — and the month isn’t quite over yet!

• Evotec is acquiring Sanofi’s infectious disease unit for the equivalent of nearly $70 million;
• Roche Holding AG is swallowing the remaining interest in Foundation Medicine that it doesn’t already own for $2.4B;
• A Chinese consortium is buying Sirtex Medical for $1.4B;
• Stryker has made a take-over approach to Boston Scientific rumored to be a multi-billion dollar offer;
• Fortive has made a $2.8 billion offer for J&J’s advanced sterilization business; and
• Philips has made an offer including a $292 million upfront payment for AF ablation start-up EPD.

These deals continue a string of M&A deals announced since the start of 2018, which is headed for record highs — both in the number of deals and the size of those transactions. Overall, healthcare M&A values surged globally during 2017, rising 27% to $332 billion, while the deal count increased 16%. That very robust activity looks to be continuing in 2018.

We strongly believe that despite the recent activity in the public markets, M&A is a far superior path to return on capital for investors — and these numbers support our views.

As a result, we here at Outcome are looking forward to a busy M&A calendar for the remainder of 2018!