Roche Holdings Offers to Buy Illumina
Roche Holdings AG offered to buy Illumina Inc. (ILMN) for $44.50 per share in cash, or for a total amount of about $5.7 billion, it said in a statement today. The offer represents a 64 percent premium over Illumina’s stock price on Dec. 21, the day before market speculation about a potential deal between Roche and Illumina triggered an increase in Illumina’s stock price, Roche said.
An acquisition of Illumina would offer benefits including strengthening Roche’s position in the life science and diagnostics market, Roche said.
Roche Chief Executive Officer Severin Schwan said Dec. 22 that the swiss drugmaker was open to a deal as big as $3 billion and is ready to “seize” the right opportunities for acquisitions.
Illumina has been “unwilling to participate in substantive discussions,” Roche said.
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Ben Livesey at blivesey@bloomberg.net
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