GSK has offered to pay up to $3.3bn (£2.6bn) for a US vaccine maker, after the pandemic pushed the importance of biotechnology to the top of the healthcare agenda.
The British pharmaceutical giant is set to pay $2.1bn (£1.6bn) upfront, and up to $1.2bn (£951m) more if the biopharmaceutical firm Affinivax meets specified development milestones, GSK said in a statement this morning.
Affinivax, based in Boston, focuses on vaccines which target pneumococcal disease, which includes pneumonia, meningitis, bloodstream infections and milder diseases such as sinusitis.
Chief scientific officer and president of research and development (R&D) at GSK, Dr Hal Barron, said the proposed acquisition will strengthen its vaccines R&D pipeline, as well as “provides access to a new, potentially disruptive technology”.
“We look forward to working with the many talented people at Affinivax to combine our industry-leading development, manufacturing, and commercialisation capabilities to make this exciting new technology available to those in need.”
It comes off the back of London-headquartered GSK hiring a Pfizer vaccine executive in November last year, after failing to bring a Covid-19 jab to the market during the pandemic.
GSK poached Pfizer vaccine lead Phil Dormitzer, who joined the company as global head of vaccines and R&D effective, having been vice president and chief scientific officer of the rival pharmaceutical giant.
Dormitzer also headed up the team which produced Pfizer’s Covid-19 vaccine, one of the most widely used vaccines in Britain.
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