LEX Drugs got the week off to a flying start. Three big acquisitions were announced in the pharma sector: Germany’s Merck bid $7.2bn for US-based healthcare products group Millipore, Japan’s Astellas made an unsolicited $3.5bn cash offer for OSI of the US and Pfizer was rumoured to have made a $4bn approach for Germany’s generic drugmaker Ratiopharm.
Chemicals were then thrown in for good measure. Fertiliser group CF Industries returned to try and muscle in on an attempt by Norway’s Yara to buy competitor Terra Industries of the US. And Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Industries may be forced to look elsewhere after its third bid of $14.5bn for the bankrupt fuels, chemicals and plastics maker LyondellBasell was rebuffed. The most significant deal of the week, however, was the mooted $35.5bn takeover of AIG’s Asian life insurance business, AIA, by Prudential that would create Asia’s largest international insurer. Next to enter the acquisition fray may be large tech companies, that are collectively hoarding vast sums of cash.
