AstraZeneca divestitures non core assets again! Three anti-inflammatory drugs sold to covis for $372 million

British pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca recently announced that it has reached an agreement with Swiss pharmaceutical company covispharma to sell three drugs, Alvesco, a sustained asthma treatment drug, and omniris and zetonnna, a rhinitis related nasal symptoms treatment drug The rights and interests involved include the commercial rights and interests of three drugs in markets outside the United States and royalties in the United States market Covis is currently selling the three drugs in the U.S market and will become the full owner of the drugs when the deal is completed The transaction does not involve the transfer of AstraZeneca employees or related facilities Mark Mallon, executive vice president of global product and portfolio strategy of AstraZeneca, said, "one of our strategic objectives is to divest some of our portfolio products so that we can allocate resources to develop innovative drugs and address unmet patient needs in key areas Covis has a strong ability to sell drugs globally, and the asset sale agreement with covis means patients will continue to benefit from Alvesco, omnis and zetonna " "The agreement with AstraZeneca is a very exciting milestone for the company and is consistent with our strategy to build a global respiratory / allergy franchise," said Michael Porter, CEO of covis When the company acquired the US market rights of Alvesco, omnaris and zetona in 2017, it realized the importance of these drugs in the field of respiratory and allergy treatment We look forward to expanding coverage to meet the needs of patients and doctors around the world " Alvesco is an inhaled anti-inflammatory maintenance therapy administered by metered inhalers to help control persistent asthma Omnaris and zetonna are two nasal sprays for the treatment of nasal symptoms related to seasonal allergic rhinitis and allergic / non allergic perennial rhinitis The active ingredient in all three drugs is ciclesonide, a synthetic corticosteroid that helps relieve inflammation In 2017, the three drugs generated a total of US $106 million in sales for AstraZeneca According to the financial terms of the agreement, covis will pay AstraZeneca $350 million after the closing of the transaction, as well as milestone payments of up to $21 million related to conditional sales for the next four years starting in 2019 The closure of the agreement is in line with customary conditions and is expected to be completed by the end of 2018 AstraZeneca said the agreement will not affect the company's financial guidance in 2018 Sell, sell! Continue to divest non core assets and focus on three key treatment areas It is worth mentioning that this asset sale is the second asset sale made by AstraZeneca in just one week Just last week, the company sold the rights and interests of two gastric medicines to gr ü nenthal (Grant), a German pharmaceutical company, for us $922 million, specifically including the commercial rights and interests of Nexium (esomeprazole) in the European market, and the commercial rights and interests of vimovo (napson / esomeprazole) in the global market except the United States and Japan AstraZeneca received a total of $815 million in advance payments for the sale of the assets (for details, AstraZeneca sold two gastric medicines for us $920 million, which was taken over by the old German pharmaceutical company) Prior to the two transactions, AstraZeneca had carried out several similar divestitures to raise cash In May, AstraZeneca signed a $538 million sale agreement with China green leaf pharmaceutical for Seroquel and sustained-release tablets In July, AstraZeneca sold its European stake in heart failure and hypertension brand Atacand to German pharmaceutical company cheplapharm Previous deals have also brought billions of dollars in cash to AstraZeneca In a huge agreement signed in July 2017, AstraZeneca and MSD cooperated on its PARP inhibitor lynparza, selling half of the revenue equity of the drug in exchange for us $1.6 billion in cash, which together with the milestone gold made the total value of the transaction reach US $8.5 billion The agreement also includes the development of a combination of keytruda, a PD-1 tumor immunotherapy, and selumetinib, another MEK inhibitor from AstraZeneca, in cooperation with MSD Further on, AstraZeneca signed an agreement to sell the rights and interests of some heart drugs to recordati, an Italian pharmaceutical company; sold the rights and interests of narcotic drugs to Aspen for $770 million; sold the antibiotic business to Pfizer for $1.575 billion; and sold the gout drug zurampuc to Ironwood AstraZeneca's series of asset sales has also been criticized by some analysts and investors However, mark Mallon, executive vice president of global strategy, said, "one of the company's strategic objectives is to continuously reduce the scale of non core treatment areas and invest resources in three key franchises, namely, oncology, cardiovascular, metabolic and respiratory diseases This also means that AstraZeneca may further spin off other products in the future " (Sina medical compiler / newborn) article reference source: 1 Astrazenecanalls of fthreedrugsindealworth $350million 2 AstraZeneca's rummagesalescontinueswith $350mdeal, itssecondinaweek