Dive Brief:
Boehringer Ingelheim will pay 1.18 billion euros, or roughly $1.4 billion, to buy the private Swiss biotech NBE-Therapeutics and gain access to its technology for targeted cancer treatment.
Boehringer is building on an earlier investment from its venture fund that helped found NBE along with other investors including PPF Group and Novo Holdings of Denmark.
The companies expect their deal to close in the first quarter of next year, at which point NBE will operate as a new site within the larger Boehringer organization while staying in its current headquarters in Basel, Switzerland.
Dive Insight:
NBE is the latest in a string of acquisitions meant to strengthen Boehringer s position in the cancer drug market. In 2018, the German pharmaceutical giant paid 210 million euros for the immune-oncology company ViraTherapeutics. The following year, it brought in AMAL Therapeutics SA, a cancer vaccine developer, through a deal valued at as much as 325 million euros.