AstraZeneca will acquire Almirall's respiratory drug portfolio

WASHINGTON - July 31, 2014 - PRLog -- AstraZeneca has announced its plans to enter into an agreement with Almirall to transfer over its respiratory franchise for an initial cost consideration of $875 million on completion, and up to $1.22 billion in development, launch, and sales-related milestones.

AstraZeneca will own the rights to develop and commercialize Almirall’s respiratory business. This of course includes the rights to revenues from Almirall’s present partnerships and the company’s current pipeline of investigational novel therapies.

Almirall’s respiratory portfolio and franchise includes: Eklira® (aclidinium); LAS40464, the combination of aclidinium with formoterol which has been filed for registration in the EU and is being developed in the US; LAS100977 (abediterol), a once-daily long-acting beta2-agonist (LABA) in Phase II; an M3 antagonist beta2-agonist (MABA) platform in pre-clinical development (LAS191351, LAS194871) and Phase I (LAS190792); and multiple pre-clinical programmes.

This acquisition will further propel AstraZeneca’s presence in the respiratory market adding to their successful product pipeline which includes: Symbicort® and Pulmicort®, as well as the company’s investigational medicines in development. AstraZeneca will receive immediate access to on market revenue which will boost the company’s overall revenue growth.  Pascal Soriot, Chief Executive Officer of AstraZeneca said: “Our agreement with Almirall brings strategic and long-term value to AstraZeneca’s strong respiratory franchise, one of our key growth platforms. We will benefit from immediate and growing product revenues which we anticipate will be rapidly accretive to earnings. Chronic respiratory disease affects hundreds of millions of people around the world. By combining our innovative portfolios and leveraging AstraZeneca’s global scientific and commercial capabilities, we will strengthen our ability to address the entire spectrum of care in asthma and COPD. I very much look forward to welcoming the Almirall people to our company.”

Jorge Gallardo, President of Almirall added: “This important agreement allows us to better develop our assets and expertise in respiratory with AstraZeneca, an experienced player in this therapeutic area. It also allows us to better balance the costs, risks and returns of the respiratory business while retaining an important economic interest in its future success. All this constitutes a very solid baseline to move more aggressively in specialty areas and particularly towards becoming a global dermatology player. R&D will remain a key part of Almirall’s business going forward and hopefully a significant long-term growth driver."

The anticipated closing of this transaction is expected to be complete by the end of 2014.

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