Novartis plans to sell the animal health business of Merck, Bayer and Lilly

Source: 21st century economic report 2013-12-11 core tip: Recently, Novartis Switzerland also frequently reported that it intends to sell its animal health business, while the recipient was said to be Bayer, Germany, which has been coveting for a long time Among the top 10 pharmaceutical companies in the world, those involved in the field of animal health care seem to be struggling repeatedly in recent years about whether to abandon the business Since Pfizer, Novartis has also frequently reported that it intends to sell its animal health business, and the recipient is likely to be Bayer, Germany, which has been coveting for a long time Several days ago, Reuters quoted sources as saying that Novartis was opening its accounting books for its animal health business to a number of competitors, including Bayer Group, in order to attract the interest of potential buyers The source further revealed that the turnover fee of the business may exceed 3 billion euros (about 4.1 billion US dollars) Although Novartis has not released the list of many mysterious buyers, in terms of capital strength and business matching, American Lilly, Pfizer, German Bayer, Merck and bringer Ingelheim, which are also among the top 10 pharmaceutical companies and have retained the business line, have opportunities Since the second half of 2012, Novartis has had a great reshuffle of animal health business All the major pharmaceutical giants have always adhered to the business action of refusing to return, which also makes Novartis's business selling direction more confused In 2012, the market size of the global animal health industry is about 24 billion US dollars, of which the market size of animal vaccine is about 5.2 billion US dollars, with a considerable industrial capacity However, Novartis appears to be losing market share in this segment due to the fact that performance in the animal health market has not improved significantly in recent years Although Novartis never disclosed the financial data of its separate business segment to the public, according to Citigroup's previous analysis, "as of October this year, Novartis's animal health business (including all the company's debts) was worth about $4 billion." However, this figure still lags behind zoetis (formerly Pfizer's animal health department, with the Chinese name of "shuotang") and Merck According to Bloomberg, Novartis has yet to receive a final price from any of its buyers However, Novartis, together with Goldman Sachs, a well-known investment bank, last month evaluated the value of the company's existing product line, hoping to make clear which animal health products it owns can really bring sales growth In addition, Novartis is considering selling OTC (over-the-counter drugs) and vaccines in addition to its animal health business Just last month, Joe Jimenez, Novartis's chief executive, said that Novartis wanted to be the industry leader in its businesses, otherwise it would consider splitting them up Before the reshuffle of global animal health care, Pfizer, the world's largest pharmaceutical company, tried to split its animal health business for a separate IPO The sale of Novartis' subdivision business is likely to lead to a new location adjustment of the industry On February 1 this year, Pfizer officially announced that its original animal health business division had been split into zoetis, an independent company, and began trading on the New York Stock Exchange It is also an important landmark move for Pfizer to announce a long-term strategy focusing on its core biopharmaceutical advantages Just before Pfizer made this major decision, there was a lot of selling rumors, including Novartis and Bayer, which were the key targets of the business negotiation at that time It's not hard to understand the reason for the split of animal health care For example, Pfizer has invested more than 70 billion dollars in research and development in this field in the past decade, but has only harvested two heavy-duty products with annual sales of more than 1 billion dollars The input-output ratio is under great pressure Merck, now second in the segment, seems to have a similar intention Although the company's animal health business sold about $3.4 billion worldwide last year, Merck's CEO said earlier that Merck might consider replicating Pfizer's previously split business to focus on strategic change plans for human medicine At present, Merck has about 30 production bases of animal health products in different countries and regions, covering more than 300 products Unlike Merck's main business focus plan, Bayer, as the most powerful buyer of Novartis case, is increasingly interested in the field of animal health The strategic significance of Bayer's animal health business has been highlighted since its US $145 million acquisition of Teva's animal health business last September Recently, marijn Dekkers, Bayer's chief executive, said vaguely that "we are deeply interested in developing the animal health business" when it comes to the purchase of Novartis's subordinate businesses by companies concerned by the outside world