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Takeda to purchase Millennium Pharma for US$8.8 billion

Takeda Pharmaceutical Co, Japan’s largest drugmaker, agreed to buy Millennium Pharmaceuticals Inc for US$8.8 billion, gaining a blood-cancer medicine before the patent on its best-selling Actos diabetes pill expires in 2011.

Stockholders of Cambridge, Massachusetts-based Millennium will receive US$25 a share in cash, 53 percent more than yesterday’s closing price, the two companies said in a statement today. It is Japan’s largest drug acquisition.

Millennium’s cancer treatment Velcade widens the product pipeline Osaka-based Takeda is developing to buffer sales once Actos faces generic competition. Rival Eisai Co agreed in December to buy US drugmaker MGI Pharma Inc for US$3.9 billion to gain more cancer medicines.

“This deal will boost Takeda’s drug-development flow,” said Mitsuo Ohmi, a Tokyo-based analyst at Japan Advisory LLC. “Millennium is a leader in genome medicine, with some promising drugs in early development.”

The US company generated US$265 million in sales last year from Velcade, which is sold in more than 80 countries. Overall revenue climbed 8 percent to US$528 million. Millennium earned US$14.9 million in net income, its first profit since 1998, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

Takeda fell 2.5 percent to ¥5,410 on the Tokyo Stock Exchange before the announcement. Millennium gained 41 percent in the past year. The takeover premium is more than double the 23 percent Tokyo-based Eisai paid to acquire MGI Pharma.

Japanese drugmakers are expanding outside the world’s second-largest drug market because domestic growth is hampered by a government policy to cut prescription-medicine prices every two years.

“Millennium has strong discovery, development and commercial capabilities led by a well-established management team,” Takeda president Yasuchika Hasegawa said in the statement. “Takeda is committed to becoming a global leader in oncology.”
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