Merck & Co., Inc. (NYSE: MRK), the global healthcare and pharmaceutical company, has acquired Immune Design (NASDAQ: IMDZ) for $300 million. Merck will buy all outstanding shares of Immune Design at a value of $5.85 per share. With reported revenue of only $2 million, Immune Design’s price tag equals close to a 136x EBITDA multiple.
Out of this deal, Merck will gain key intellectual properties from Immune Design: GLAAS and ZVex. These properties can potentially activate the immune system’s natural ability to generate and expand immune cells to fight cancer and other chronic diseases.
The acquisition of Immune Design highlights the demand for immunotherapy platforms and properties. Since the start of the fourth quarter in 2018, four licensing or collaboration agreements involving immunotherapy properties and candidates have been made public.
GlaxoSmithKline plc (NYSE: GSK) paid $342 million upfront to Merck KGaA, Darmstadt, Germany for a collaboration agreement on M7824, an investigational protein immunotherapy. Merck KGaA is also eligible for up to $3.31 billion in milestone payments.
AbbVie, Inc. paid $90 million to TeneoOne, Inc. for the commercialization and development rights for TNB-383B, an immunotherapeutic candidate for the potential treatment of multiple myeloma.
Celgene Corporation (NASDAQ: CELG) bought exclusive options to license cell therapies that utilize Obsidian Therapeutics‘s Destabilizing Domain technology, which offers additional support in cellular immunotherapies for cancer treatment. Atara Biotherapeutics, Inc. (NASDAQ: ATRA), acquired rights to an antigen receptor T-cell (CAR T) immunotherapy for treatment against cancer and solid tumors from Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. Neither one of those deals had a disclosed price.
The transaction between Merck and Immune Design is expected to close early in the second quarter of 2019. On a trailing 12-month basis, Merck reported revenue of $42.3 billion, EBITDA of $14.5 billion, and net income of $6.2 billion.
