Amid Novo Nordisk and Pfizer’s whiplash contest for obesity biotech Metsera, Novo’s CEO has, quite literally, told his company's rival to put its money where its mouth is.
“Novo Nordisk and Pfizer right now are in the middle of an acquisition dialogue and discussion,” Novo chief Maziar Mike Doustdar said at a drug pricing press conference at the White House on Thursday. “It’s us and Pfizer competing for the company and, right now, our bid is higher.”
“And our message to Pfizer,” Doustdar continued, “is that if they would like to buy the company, then put your hand in the pocket and bid higher. It’s a free market, and at the end of it, it has to do with basically the price that the seller is selling for their shareholders and the buyer’s willing to pay for it. This has nothing to do with [the Federal Trade Commission (FTC)].”
Doustdar’s comments came amid a flurry of reports that both Novo and Pfizer have submitted higher offers after already inflating their initial bids for Metsera.
As it stands, the latest public offer from Novo stands at a combined equity value of $10 billion, split between an upfront payout and potential milestones. In a press release earlier this week, Metsera said Pfizer's Nov. 3 offer stood at $8.1 billion in total.
But things have changed quite a bit since Metsera's last update on the potential sale. Among the developments this week, a court waylaid Pfizer's legal attempt to block a potential deal between Metsera and Novo. And the FTC has voiced concerns about Novo Nordisk's proposed deal structure.
Wednesday, the Financial Times and others reported that Pfizer had matched its rival's $10 billion offer. Yesterday, Endpoints and FT reported that Novo Nordisk had again raised the stakes.
Amid all this, neither potential buyer nor Metsera has released the particulars of the latest bids.
Pfizer appeared ready to part with up to $7.3 billion to acquire Metsera and its metabolic medicine pipeline at the end of September. But Novo Nordisk threw a curveball late last month when it threw down a counteroffer worth up to $9 billion.
Pfizer was quick to condemn the move, calling Novo’s surprise bid “reckless and unprecedented.”
The crown jewel of Metsera’s pipeline is MET-097i, an injectable GLP-1 asset in phase 2b testing that could be dosed just once a month. In the clinic, the biotech also boasts a monthly injectable amylin analog, which Metsera has considered combining with MET-097i and an oral GLP-1 to overcome the scalability challenges of other oral peptide drugs.