Pharma BD Deal Intelligence
A modest tuck-in that Schering-Plough itself failed to capitalize on before disappearing. Schering-Plough paid $18M upfront for NeoGenesis's ALIS screening platform and roughly 80 scientists, but no drug ever reached market from the technology, and Schering-Plough's own 2009 acquisition by Merck led to the Cambridge site's closure within about five years.
A small drug-discovery-tech tuck-in that got absorbed and then erased when its acquirer itself was acquired four years later
Full analysis, sources & comparables →Schering-Plough sought to 'improve its drug discovery technology and establish a beachhead in the fertile Cambridge biotechnology cluster.'
Fred Hassan, Chairman and CEO, Schering-Plough: 'This acquisition will further strengthen the discovery capabilities of Schering-Plough and is another…
Fred Hassan served as Final CEO & Chairman of Schering-Plough from April 2003 to November 3, 2009, when Schering-Plough merged with Merck & Co.
Source summaries from our enrichment pipeline; follow links for originals.
All 5 sources with sentiment breakdown →
Schering-Plough acquires most assets of NeoGenesis Pharmaceuticals (chemistry/discovery platform). February 2005.
A small drug-discovery-tech tuck-in that got absorbed and then erased when its acquirer itself was acquired four years later
Assessment window: 15yr post-close.
NeoGenesis Pharmaceuticals was a privately held Cambridge, Massachusetts biotech applying mass-spectrometry-based affinity screening (the ALIS platform — Automated Ligand Identification System) and chemistry technology to discover small-molecule drug leads. Rather than developing therapeutics for a single indication, NeoGenesis was a discovery-stage technology platform whose value lay in feeding lead compounds into partner pipelines.
By early 2005, Schering-Plough was 18 months into Fred Hassan's turnaround after the 2003 consent decree and SEC issues, with R&D productivity a top concern. Competing big-pharma drug-discovery moves of the era included Pfizer's 2003 Esperion deal, Merck's 2004 Aton Pharma acquisition, and Lilly's 2004 Applied Molecular Evolution buy. Schering-Plough and NeoGenesis 'had maintained a research collaboration since 1999', making the acquisition a logical conversion of an existing partnership rather than competitive M&A. Fred Hassan said the deal would 'further strengthen the discovery capabilities of Schering-Plough and is another important step in our commitment to build a best-in-class research organization.' Satish Jindal, Ph.D., became Vice President at Schering-Plough Research Institute and Cambridge site head, reporting to Catherine D. Strader, Ph.D., EVP for Discovery Research. The Boston Globe noted the move gave Schering-Plough 'a beachhead in the fertile Cambridge biotechnology cluster'. Forward-looking close: Schering-Plough was acquired by Merck in November 2009 for ~$41B, absorbing the Cambridge site into Merck Research Laboratories; the ALIS fragment-based screening technology contributed to Merck's later HCV protease inhibitor (boceprevir) and other small-molecule programs but was never publicly attributed to a marketed product, illustrating how platform-acquisition value compounds invisibly through R&D pipelines.
| Deal | Year | Value | Outcome |
|---|---|---|---|
| Schering-Plough Corp. / NeoGenesis Pharmaceuticals (this deal) | 2005 | — | 30 |
| Schering-Plough Corp. / Organon International | 2007 | $14.4B | 56 |
| Schering-Plough Corp. / Organon & Co. | 2007 | $14.4B | 48 |
| Schering-Plough Corp. / Organon BioSciences N.V. (Akzo Nobel) | 2007 | $14.5B | 48 |
| AstraZeneca PLC / KuDOS Pharmaceuticals Limited | 2005 | $210M | 98 |
| Yamanouchi Pharmaceutical / Fujisawa Pharmaceutical Co. Ltd. | 2005 | — | 92 |
| Sankyo Co., Ltd. / Daiichi Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. | 2005 | $8.0B | 92 |