Swiss pharmaceutical giant Roche is spending around $1 billion to acquire a San Diego-based biotechnology company that’s trying to treat certain cancers and rare diseases with a slate of cell therapies and genetic medicines.
The deal, announced Tuesday, has Roche paying $9 per share of Poseida Therapeutics. Poseida investors may additionally receive as much as $4 per share more via a so-called contingent value right if the biotech’s drug programs hit specific research and commercial milestones. The acquisition is expected to close sometime between January and the end of March.
The two companies were already working together through a licensing agreement inked in 2022. Terms of the new deal suggest Roche sees even more promise in Poseida’s gene editing technologies, which are being used to create allogeneic, or “off-the-shelf,” cell therapies that don’t rely on a patient’s own donor cells. Roche’s offer is 215% above Poseida’s closing share price on Monday — representing one of the largest premiums paid in a big-ticket biopharma acquisition over the past several years.
Poseida’s therapies target both solid tumors, including prostate, breast and lung, as well as blood cancers like multiple myeloma and acute myeloid leukemia. The company also has a couple genetic medicines directed at the liver to treat hemophilia A and an uncommon swelling disorder known as hereditary angioedema.
The acquisition should help Roche “drive further progress in allogeneic cell therapy” and bring forward “potentially first and best-in-class cell therapies in oncology, immunology and neurology,” according to Chief Medical Officer Levi Garraway.
Garraway added that his company is “very encouraged by the early clinical data” Poseida’s programs have generated so far.
Roche isn’t alone in its interest. One of Japan’s biggest drugmakers, Astellas, this spring paid $50 million — and offered up to $550 million on the back end — to partner with Poseida. The collaboration aims to develop two cell therapies for solid tumors, and was signed less than a year after Astellas took a nearly 9% stake in Poseida.
Another Japan-based firm, Takeda Pharmaceutical, spent $45 million in 2021 to get an exclusive worldwide license to some of Poseida’s technologies. But Takeda ultimately terminated that agreement in July 2023.
Roche noted in a statement that the acquisition hands it not only Poseida’s drug programs and suite of technologies, but also the company’s manufacturing operations. Poseida has an internal, so-called Good Manufacturing Practices facility that’s adjacent to its San Diego headquarters and is the company’s sole source of clinical manufacturing.
Additionally, the deal gives Roche an entry point into an accelerating industry competition to develop cell therapies for autoimmune diseases. Poseida has a cellular drug that it plans to evaluate as a treatment for lupus and multiple sclerosis.
Behind some of its big pharma peers, Roche has been playing catch up in cancer cell therapies. In addition to its earlier Poseida agreement, it has joined forces with Arsenal Biosciences and Adaptimmune, though that latter partnership recently fizzled.
