8:15-9:15AM

Deals in Depth: Understanding the Rationale Driving The Year's Most Strategically Interesting Alliances

Whether licensing or acquisition, global or regional, structuring deals to spread risk and reward has rarely if ever been more of an exercise in creativity than it is today.  We’ve chosen three deals across a broad spectrum of strategic initiatives that provide case studies for this new, creative dealmaking environment.  Each has a European flavour, and of  course there are options, earn-outs and carve-outs galore. We’ll discuss deal-specific and broader questions, including  how Ipsen’s combined out-licensing/equity stake/option arrangement with Inspiration fits into the French pharma’s unique approach to specialty franchise building; AstraZeneca’s  and Forest’s creative collaboration to gain full access to Novexel’s antibiotic pipeline, and, amid a flurry of late-stage asset acquisitions, why AZ chose Targacept’s nicotinic channel blocker for major depressive disorder to enter into one of the riches alliances in recent memory.  This panel will look at the impact of these exemplary transactions and deal structures on the participants’ broader strategies and alliance/M&A transactions more globally going forward.

Robert J. Easton, Chairman, Scisive Consulting LP (moderator) 

Ipsen/Inspiration
Jean-Luc Belingard, Chairman and CEO, Ipsen

AZ/Targacept
Beth Fordham-Meier, Vice President, Licensing and Intellectual Property, Targacept

GSK/Prosensa
Luc Dochez, Chief Business Officer and SVP of Business Development, Prosensa

Fran Heller, Executive Vice President of Business Development, Exelixis