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NOVARTIS

Novartis to buy US gene therapy group AveXis for $8.7 bn

Swiss pharmaceuticals giant Novartis announced Monday it will buy US gene therapy company AveXis for $8.7 billion (€7.1 billion).

Published: 9 April 2018 08:43 CEST
Novartis to buy US gene therapy group AveXis for $8.7 bn
Novartis said the acquisition would broaden its leadership in neuroscience. Photo: AFP

It said the all-cash deal was approved unanimously by the boards of both firms.

The Illinois-based AveXis is involved in clinical studies for the treatment of spinal muscular atrophy (SMA), a rare neurodegenerative disease caused by a defect in a single gene.

“The proposed acquisition of AveXis offers an extraordinary opportunity to transform the care of SMA,” Novartis CEO Vas Narasimhan was quoted as saying in a company statement.

“The acquisition would also accelerate our strategy to pursue high-efficacy, first-in-class therapies and broaden our leadership in neuroscience.”

The announcement comes less than two weeks after Novartis said it will sell its stake in its consumer healthcare joint venture to Britain's GlaxoSmithKline for $13 billion.

The group said the sale of the 36.5 percent stake will enable it “to further focus on the development and growth of its core businesses.”

Novartis in January reported that strong sales of two of its main blockbuster drugs enabled it to turn in a “good operational performance” in 2017.

Net profit climbed by 15 percent to $7.7 billion in 2017 on a one-percent increase in sales to $49.1 billion.

NOVARTIS

Switzerland’s Novartis to help make Pfizer-BioNTech Covid vaccine

Swiss pharmaceuticals giant Novartis said Friday it had signed an initial agreement to help produce the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine against Covid-19, as countries scramble to boost supplies.

Published: 29 January 2021 15:53 CET
Switzerland's Novartis to help make Pfizer-BioNTech Covid vaccine
Novartis will help manufacture Pfizer vaccine. Photo by AFP.

The rare act of cooperation — in an industry usually marked by cut-throat competition — comes after French pharma group Sanofi announced earlier this week that it would also team up with rivals Pfizer and BioNTech to help produce 125 million doses of their jab.

The two-dose vaccine, which is based on mRNA technology, has been shown to be around 95 percent effective and has been approved for use by the World Health Organization and in some 50 countries.

But it is in limited supply as nations around the world race to immunise their populations against the coronavirus, which has killed nearly 2.2 million people in just over a year.

Novartis said in a statement that it would use its sterilised manufacturing facilities at its site in Stein, Switzerland to help produce the Pfizer-BioNTech jabs.

Under the agreement, the company said it would “take bulk mRNA active ingredient from BioNTech and fill this into vials under aseptic conditions for shipment back to BioNTech for their distribution to healthcare system customers around the world”.

Once a final agreement is reached, Novartis said it expected to begin production in the second quarter of the year, with initial shipment of finished product expected in the third quarter.

Steffen Lang, Head of Novartis Technical Operations, stressed that the company was “committed to leverage our manufacturing capabilities to help support the supply of COVID-19 vaccines and therapeutics around the world”.

“We expect this to be the first of a number of such agreements,” he said in the statement.

Novartis said it was already in “advanced discussions” with a number of other companies about with other production tasks, including of mRNA, therapeutic protein and raw material production for Covid vaccines and therapeutics. 

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