/biz/ - Business & Finance

On top of owning the rights (and needing to develop NT-219), Merck would now own all of Kitov's drugs that are already approved and generating royalties. Granted it's not much currently, but it's something. Lastly I don't think Kitov hires a PR firm to announce a collab with a major Pharma company. They've already gone through that rodeo and understand the ropes. Usually you bring in the big boys, for big boy moves. ie. Acquisitions and Chapter 11. Considering they just did a DO for $55mil, chapter 11 is not what they need a big boy PR firm for.
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NT-219 has shown to overcome drug resistance in all these drugs in some form and cancer treatment is a 200bil market. Buying NT-219 could basically corner you 10% of the chemo market. Essentially 10-20bil per every year. That number also typically increases 6-10% year over year. Keytruda is a 5-7bil a year market, while 20% is drug resistant. So they could potentially make a further 1-2billion per year alone on Keytruda by coupling it with NT-219. So now you're making money prescribing Keytruda and NT-219. Double dip into the profits. It would basically take 6months for Merck to pay off the 4.5bil used to acquire Kitov—————
I've also been diving into the likelihood of an acquisition and if Kitov's drug works as good as they say it does, there is no chance they aren't made a very generous offer. The question is, is Squibb ready to lose the race entirely? This won't just lose them the lung cancer race, but the whole head and neck race too. Buying Kitov would be their ticket back. If you're Merck, you will refuse to give up market control.