Swedish Orphan Biovitrum AB (STO: SOBI), an international specialty healthcare company dedicated to rare diseases, announced its acquisition of Dova Pharmaceuticals, Inc. for $867.7 million (65.3x revenue), or 27$ per share. Dova acquires, develops and commercializes drug candidates for diseases such as thrombocytopenia, a condition that leaves an individual with a low blood platelet count. Its primary candidate, Doptelet, is pending approval for the treatment of chemotherapy-induced thrombocytopenia (CIT).
A CVR worth $1.50 per share will be granted if Doptelet is approved, totaling a potential $915 million. An indirect subsidiary of Sobi is acquiring Dove to bolster its hematology and orphan diseases pipeline.
This is Sobi’s second deal of the year, reporting an acquisition in Q2 for a little over $516 million. The pharmaceutical firm bought a newly established company that owns emapalumab and related assets from Novimmune.
Emapalumab is indicated for pediatric (newborn and older) and adult primary haemophagocytic lymphohistiocytosis (HLH) patients with refractory, recurrent or progressive disease, or intolerance to conventional HLH therapy.
This acquisition overrides the previous license agreement Sobi had with Novimmune. Sobi will gain all assets relating to emapalumab including intellectual property, patent rights, data and know-how, two new immuno-oncology candidates, and relevant employees. The deal closed in Q3.
Sobi’s acquisition of Dova is actually the second-largest pharmaceutical deal of the third quarter, according to our Deal Search Online database, trailing Amgen, Inc.’s (NASDAQ: AMGN) purchase of the worldwide rights to Otezla from Celgene Corporation (NASDAQ: CELG) for $13.4 billion.
