Un­like Mer­ck, Bris­tol My­ers to fo­cus on bolt-ons af­ter M&A spree

Bris­tol My­ers Squibb like­ly won’t be on the hunt for big M&A tar­gets in 2024 af­ter pulling off a $14 bil­lion deal for Karuna Ther­a­peu­tics and its schiz­o­phre­nia drug, ex­ec­u­tives said dur­ing Fri­day’s earn­ings call.

This year’s M&A strat­e­gy will fo­cus more on bolt-ons and li­cens­ing op­por­tu­ni­ties in­stead, as new CEO Chris Boern­er out­lined an up­com­ing “tran­si­tion pe­ri­od” start­ing in 2026. The com­ments come not on­ly af­ter the Karuna buy­out, but al­so a small­er deal spree over the last six months: Bris­tol My­ers al­so ac­quired Mi­rati ($4.8 mil­lion) and Rayze­Bio ($4.1 bil­lion) while part­ner­ing with Sys­tIm­mune ($800 mil­lion up­front) and Orum ($100 mil­lion up­front).

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