Circassia Pharmaceuticals has made an all cash offer to acquire Aerocrine, a Swedish company focused on the development and commercialization of medical diagnostic products for use in the diagnosis and management of patients with asthma, for up to $216.4 million.
Circassia also intends to acquire Prosonix, a privately-held specialty pharmaceutical company focused on the development of product candidates to treat asthma and/or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), for an aggregate cash consideration of up to $156.6 million. Circassia proposes to raise $430.8 million, through a placing and open offer.
Steve Harris, chief executive, Circassia, said, "These proposed acquisitions and associated fundraising significantly accelerate Circassia's strategy to become a self-sustaining specialty biopharmaceutical company focused on allergy and asthma. The combined organization will give us both the capability and resources to commercialize our enlarged late-stage pipeline of potential new allergy and asthma products, once approved, and thereby generate significant shareholder value.”
"We believe Aerocrine's established commercial infrastructure, which already is targeting our core potential customers in key markets, will optimize the launch of Cat-SPIRE, which is the first of our next generation allergy immunotherapies and which remains on track to report pivotal phase III results in H1 2016,” said Harris. “Additionally, Prosonix's innovative technology gives us a portfolio of near-term products targeting asthma and other respiratory diseases, which complement our current pipeline and should enable us to further leverage Aerocrine's commercial infrastructure."
The board of directors of Aerocrine has unanimously recommended Aerocrine's shareholders to accept the offer by Circassia. The total value of the offer is a premium of 85% to Aerocrine's undisturbed closing price on April 22 and premiums of 92% and 99% to the three-month and six-month volume-weighted average prices preceding April 22. The acceptance period of the offer is expected to commence on May 19 and expire on June 11, subject to any extensions.
