QDIS Blog

Well, Lester Crawford finally pled guilty to filing false and misleading financial disclosures while head of the FDA.

Ex-FDA chief pleads guilty to charges - MarketWatch:

I have been curious for a long time as to what company he owned and what the conflict was. Seems it is Pepsico and Sysco and this was because Crawford was head of the obesity working group that was working on recommendations regarding food labeling and calorie counting. Both these companies definitely have interests in this so there is a clear conflict of interest.

Lester Crawford could face six months in jail or house arrest and/or $50,000 fine. It will be interesting to see what he actually gets. My guess, 2-3 months house arrest (probably none) and maybe $10,000 fine.

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Here are a couple of interesting articles recently about Sanofi-Aventis and Imclone. The first article claims that they were going to merge.

Sanofi-Aventis Is Said to Be Mystery Suitor for ImClone in Deal Scuttled by Icahn - New York Times

Then Sanofi says that isn’t going to happen.

Sanofi Denies Pursuing ImClone:

It will be interesting since sometimes such protest means they are at least thinking about it. I personally don’t think it will happen but it will be interesting to see if anything happens.

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Another merger from earlier this week (article is from Oct 13).

RedOrbit - Health - Pennsylvania Company Buys RxKinetix

Endo Pharmaceuticals is going to buy RxKinetix Inc. based on Boulder, CO for $95 million. RxKinetix Inc. is developing a drug called RK-0202 to treat mouth sores associated with chemotherapy. Not much else to report on this but it is part of a larger continuing merger activity in the pharmaceutical industry

Technorati Tags: Endo Pharmaceuticals, pharma M&A, pharmaceutical deals, RxKinetix Inc

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Mergers continues unabated. Today Eli Lilly announced they will acquire Icos based in Bothell, WA for $2.1 billion dollars.

Eli Lilly to buy Icos for $2.1B: Financial News - Yahoo! Finance

Icos was just on the verge of becoming profitable and they do have a joint venture with Lilly for Cialis. While not totally unexpected, it is interesting none the less. My impression is that Icos’s pipeline was pretty thin and it is surprising that Lilly offered this much for them. I guess they feel having total control of Cialis is worth that much and that anything else that comes out of the pipeline is a bonus.

THe most interesting thing will be what happens to the facilities Icos has in Bothell, WA. I know people who work there and have visited the site on several occasions. I’m not sure that Lilly will want to keep that site open and I fear for the jobs of people I know there.

Other Resources

• Yahoo! News Search Results for lilly icos
• lilly icos - Google News

Blog Searches

• Google Blog Search: LIlly Icos
• Lilly Icos - Ask.com Blog and Feed Search

Technorati Tags: Eli Lilly, Icos, pharma M&A, pharmaceutical deals, Cialis

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