AstraZeneca PLC on Tuesday said it has agreed to acquire Gracell Biotechnologies Inc, paying about $1.2 billion for the clinical-stage company.
The Cambridge, England-based pharmaceutical company said it expects the acquisition to close in the first quarter of 2024. Gracell is a Suzhou, China-based biopharmaceutical firm developing cell therapies for cancer and autoimmune diseases. It will become a wholly-owned subsidiary of AstraZeneca.
AstraZeneca will pay on closing $2.00 per Gracell share, or $10.00 per American depositary share, plus $0.30 per share or $1.50 per ADS ‘upon achievement of a specified regulatory milestone’. Gracell ADSs closed up 60% at $9.92 in New York on Tuesday.
The upfront cash portion represents a transaction value of around $1.0 billion, with the total value being about $1.2 billion if the milestone is achieved.
AstraZeneca said the deal ‘will enrich AstraZeneca‘s growing pipeline of cell therapies with GC012F, a novel, clinical-stage...potential new treatment for multiple myeloma, as well as other haematologic malignancies and autoimmune diseases’.
It said Gracell’s platform improves T cell fitness, shortens manufacturing times, and could improve the effectiveness of other autologous chimeric antigen receptor T-cell or CAR-T treatments.
‘The proposed acquisition of Gracell will complement AstraZeneca’s existing capabilities and previous investments in cell therapy,’ said Susan Galbraith, AstraZeneca’s executive vice president of Oncology R&D.
She continued: ‘GC012F will accelerate our cell therapy strategy in haematology, with the opportunity to bring a potential best-in-class treatment to patients living with blood cancers using a differentiated manufacturing process, as well as exploring the potential for cell therapy to reset the immune response in autoimmune diseases.’
Shares in AstraZeneca were up 1.0% at 10,538.00 pence
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