(May 26): Eli Lilly & Co agreed to buy three vaccine developers for as much as US$3.8 billion, marking the drugmaker’s re-entry into the infectious disease space.
The agreements with Curevo, LimmaTech Biologics and Vaccine Company give Lilly access to immunisations for shingles, common bacterial pathogens and Epstein-Barr virus, according to a statement on Tuesday.
“These acquisitions reflect a deliberate strategy to prevent disease at its source rather than treat its consequences,” Dan Skovronsky, Lilly’s chief scientific and product officer, said in a statement.
The drugmaker, flush with cash from its blockbuster obesity drugs, has been expanding into other disease areas as it builds out its pipeline beyond weight loss. The acquisitions come at a precarious time for vaccines, which have lost US government funding and support under Health Secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr.
Shares rose 1.3% in trading before US markets opened in New York.
Lilly has a long history in infectious diseases. It was one of the first companies to mass-produce penicillin in the 1940s and, over a decade later, was the first to make and distribute the Salk polio vaccine. While it also sold an antibody treatment for people at high risk during the Covid-19 pandemic, the drugmaker had largely focused its attention on other areas in the intervening decades.
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The company signalled a renewed interest in targeting infectious disease last year when it hired former Food and Drug Administration official Peter Marks to oversee its work in the area.
Now, the trio of acquisitions gives Lilly promising technologies to attack a variety of global health problems. In a deal worth as much as US$1.5 billion, it will gain Curevo’s lead product, called amezosvatein, for the prevention of shingles in adults. It could pose a challenge to GSK plc’s Shingrix.
The purchase of LimmaTech Biologics, for as much as US$780 million in cash, will allow Lilly to target bacterial pathogens that cause staph infections, gonorrhoea and chlamydia. Its lead programme, LTB-SA7, is in early-stage studies to protect against a bacteria that’s a primary cause of surgical-site infection. There are also several early programmes targeting bacterial pathogens that cause infertility and other infections that disproportionately affect women, Lilly said.
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The final buyout of Vaccine Company, worth as much as US$1.55 billion in cash, gives Lilly a proprietary vaccine platform that targets a broad set of pathogens. Its lead programme for Epstein-Barr virus is ready for early-stage trials, Lilly said.
The deals, which include upfront cash and future payments if milestones are met, were first reported by the Wall Street Journal.
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