One bid­der and a $5 hike: How Ver­tex inked $4.9B Alpine deal

Jef­frey Lei­den want­ed Alpine.

The Ver­tex chair, who had led ear­ly de­vel­op­ment of the world’s top-sell­ing med­i­cine while at Ab­bott in the 2000s, had his eyes on Alpine Im­mune Sci­ences’ in­ves­ti­ga­tion­al treat­ment known as povetaci­cept. The as­set “re­minds me very much of the po­ten­tial we saw in Hu­mi­ra in the ear­ly days of bi­o­log­ics for the treat­ment of au­toim­mune dis­ease,” Lei­den told an­a­lysts the day of the deal an­nounce­ment.

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