Deals and Financings

Columbia China has begun construction on a $150 million 500-bed multi-specialty hospital in Jiaxing, Zhejiang Province (see story). ColumbiaChina is a 50-50 joint venture between Columbia Pacific Management of Seattle, a senior living/hospital company focused on Asia, and Temasek, the sovereign wealth fund of Singapore. The new hospital, which is Columbia’s second in China, will open in 2019. Columbia China currently operates Shanghai Kaiyuan Orthopedic Hospital, a 232-bed facility.  

Fosun Pharma (SHA: 600196; HK: 2196) and Gland Pharma have devised a fallback strategy to implement if India decides to prohibit Fosun’s planned $1.3 billion acquisition of an 86% stake in Gland (see story). The two companies plan to scale back the size of the transaction, selling a 74% ownership of Gland (presumably at a price of about $1.1 billion). India’s Cabinet Committee of Economic Affairs (CCEA) reviews any foreign acquisition of a domestic company if it involves ownership of 75% or more. Otherwise, the approval is automatic. The CCEA is holding up a ruling because of a border dispute between India and China, not because it has any problems with the deal itself.  

Samsung Bioepis (KS: 207940), a division of Samsung Biologics, announced a joint venture with Japan’s Takeda Pharma (TYO: 4502) to develop novel biologic drugs (see story). The JV’s first project will be TAK-671, a candidate aimed at severe acute pancreatitis. Samsung Biologics has two divisions: a biologics CMO operation, and Samsung Bioepis, a company formed by Samsung and Biogen (NSDQ: BIIB). Until now, Bioepis has been developing biosimilars, but the Takeda agreement will take Bioepis into novel drug development for the first time. One year ago, Samsung Biologics staged a $2 billion IPO on the Korean market.