AstraZeneca have announced their purchase of Ardea Biosciences for around $1 bn. Definitely not comparable to the ~15 bn dollar acquistion of MedImmune in 2007. Not surprising is the move of AstraZeneca to any follower of Pharma industry. With such a weak late stage pipeline, AstraZeneca have been trumpeting their desire to strike deals, either licensing or acquisition. The recent collaboration with Amgen on the Immunoinflammatory area added some life to the pipeline of AZ. The collaboration with Amgen included a Phase III ready candidate, brodalumab (for psoriasis) and the rest were early stage assets. This time, the purchase of Ardea will bring another late stage asset, lesinurad (RDEA594) for gout.
Interestingly, Takeda recently announced a similar deal (pretty close in the $ too) of buying URL Pharma for around 800 mn$. URL Pharma already markets Colcrys (colchicine) for treatment of gout. Takeda already had a drug for the treatment of gout, Uloric (febuxostat) through their partners Teijin Pharma.
Overall, good news for AZ this April. first with the EMA's CHMP recommending the approval of dapagliflozin for type 2 diabetes. Dapagliflozin team at AZ might have felt a bit of relief of heat under their collars by this recommendation since earlier in Jan 2012, the US FDA issued a Complete Response Letter asking AstraZeneca for additional clinical data to allow a better assessment of the benefit-risk profile for dapagliflozin. (FDA had pushed back the PDUFA data from October 28th, 2011, to January 28th, 2012). Secondly, the purchase of Ardea.
There is light at the end of the tunnel for AstraZeneca.
