AbbVie has announced that it will be acquiring Cerevel Therapeutics for about $8.7bn, marking a significant boost to the company’s neuroscience pipeline.
The definitive agreement will grant AbbVie access to multiple clinical-stage and preclinical candidates targeting neurological and psychiatric disorders.
This includes tavapadon, a dopamine D1/D5 partial agonist currently in phase 3 testing as a treatment for Parkinson’s disease (PD), which AbbVie says could become “a near-term complementary asset” to its existing symptomatic therapies for advanced cases of the disease due to the candidate’s potential application in early PD.
Emraclidine, a positive allosteric modulator (PAM) of the muscarinic M4 receptor that may be effective in treating schizophrenia and dementia-related psychosis, is also included in the transaction, as well as darigabat, an alpha 2/3/5 selective GABAA receptor PAM for treatment-resistant epilepsy and panic disorder, and CVL-354, a kappa opioid receptor antagonist for major depressive disorder.
Richard Gonzalez, chairman and chief executive officer, AbbVie, said: “Our existing neuroscience portfolio and our combined pipeline with Cerevel represents a significant growth opportunity well into the next decade.
“AbbVie will leverage its deep commercial capabilities, international infrastructure and regulatory and clinical expertise to deliver substantial shareholder value with multibillion-dollar sales potential across Cerevel’s portfolio of assets.”
The boards of both companies have approved the transaction, which is expected to close in the middle of 2024, subject to Cerevel shareholder approval, regulatory approvals and other customary closing conditions.
Ron Renaud, president and chief executive officer, Cerevel Therapeutics, said: “With AbbVie’s long-standing expertise in developing and commercialising medicines on a global scale, Cerevel’s novel therapies will be well positioned to reach more people living with neuroscience diseases.”
The announcement comes just days after AbbVie agreed to buy cancer drug developer ImmunoGen for approximately $10.1bn.
The transaction gives AbbVie access to ImmunoGen’s antibody-drug conjugate Elahere (mirvetuximab soravtansine-gynx), which received accelerated approval from the US Food and Drug Administration last year to treat platinum-resistant ovarian cancer.
AbbVie also announced its acquisition of Mitokinin, a discovery-stage biotechnology company developing a potential disease-modifying treatment for Parkinson’s disease, in October.