Dassault to acquire Medidata in $5.7b health data push

Bloomberg

Dassault Systemes SE, a maker of industrial design software, agreed to buy Medidata Solutions Inc. for $5.7 billion to gain a foothold in the fast-growing market for clinical trial technology.
The deal pushes the French company further beyond its design roots into data processing and business analysis. Medidata’s software analyses pharmaceutical and biotech trials
for some of the world’s biggest drugmakers including Sanofi SA, Pfizer Inc. and AstraZeneca Plc.
“This is by far the largest acquisition we’ve ever made,” Pascal Daloz, chief financial officer of Dassault Systemes, said on a conference call. He said health
is becoming a crucial market for the company, whose customers are mostly in aerospace, defense and consumer goods.
The all-cash deal values New York-based Medidata at $92.25 a share, 17 percent above its closing price on April 18, the last trading day before Bloomberg reported Dassault Systemes’ interest in the company. Medidata stock fell 4.4 percent to $90.60 in premarket trading.
Shares in Dassault Systemes, which has a market value of 36 billion euros ($41 billion) and annual sales of 3.5 billion euros last year, fell as much as 3 percent before recouping some of the decline to trade down 1 percent at 11:31 am in Paris.
PERSONALISED MEDICINE
Medidata offers clients wearable sensors that help track patient health and biomarker analysis to select which patients may best respond to certain drugs.
It estimates that 13 of the top 15 medicines sold last year relied on its technology, as the healthcare industry shifts towards personalised medicine and the targeting of individual patient profiles.
President Donald Tru-mp’s protectionist trade agenda hasn’t reduced the appetite of European companies for US takeovers. In fact their appeal has been growing, potentially turning the tables after years in which Europe was mostly a target for US acquirers.