By Bhanvi Satija and Yadarisa Shabong
LONDON, June 9 (Reuters) – GSK has agreed to buy U.S.-listed cancer drug developer Nuvalent for $10.6 billion in its largest deal in more than a decade, marking a strategic shift under new CEO Luke Miels as the British company steps up its focus on oncology.
The all-cash deal values Nuvalent at about $124 per share, a 40% premium to its last closing price. Shares in Nuvalent, which develops lung cancer drugs, were up nearly 40% in U.S. premarket trade. GSK shares slipped 1.5% in London.
The deal marks a departure from GSK’s usual “bolt-on” acquisitions as Miels, who took over from Emma Walmsley in January, looks to convince investors the drugmaker can hit a bold target of £40 billion in annual revenue by 2031.
“It’s larger than the bracket because it was unusual,” Miels told reporters. “It’s essentially three products in one.”
He also said GSK’s sales targets were not dependent on the acquisition.
James Eugene, analyst at Verso Investment Management, said the size may have surprised investors who had expected deals in the $2 billion to $4 billion range. GSK’s largest deal in the past 18 months was its $2.2 billion acquisition of RAPT Therapeutics.
Analysts, though, said the Nuvalent deal made strategic sense because it added late-stage cancer assets in an area where GSK already operates, and could help offset an expected HIV patent cliff if approvals come on time.
“We see the deal as a bold move from new CEO in oncology, adding two imminent growth drivers,” Bank of America analysts said in a note.
The deal adds to a growing number of acquisitions by major pharmaceutical companies of promising therapies in fields ranging from cancer treatments to rare diseases and obesity.
BUILDING SCALE IN CANCER TREATMENTS
Miels said the Nuvalent deal offered “significant new treatment options” for lung cancer patients and created a platform to expand its experimental antibody-drug conjugate Ris-Rez, now in late-stage testing.
He has pledged to accelerate development of new medicines and target new assets to strengthen GSK’s late-stage pipeline and manage the 2028 patent expiry of its key HIV medicine dolutegravir. GSK has struck two smaller deals this year.
GSK reported a 43% rise in sales across its oncology portfolio last year to just under £2 billion, about 6% of the group’s total.
GSK is seeking to close the gap with London-listed Anglo-Swedish rival AstraZeneca, whose oncology sales accounted for 44% of the group’s total last year.
Net of cash acquired, GSK’s aggregate investment in Nuvalent is estimated to be $9.4 billion and the deal is expected to add to sales and operating profit in 2027 and core earnings per share in 2029, GSK said.
MULTI-BLOCKBUSTER POTENTIAL
Miels said GSK had tracked Nuvalent for over a year after it was first identified by its oncology and business development teams, and was internally known as “Nashville”.
Nuvalent’s data at a major medical conference last week convinced him that GSK should pursue the deal, he said.
Nuvalent’s two lead lung cancer drugs, zidesamtinib and neladalkib, will add to GSK’s basket of products that are close to being launched, with U.S. decisions for the drugs expected in September and November.
If approved, both could launch this year and GSK believes the drugs have multi-blockbuster potential. BofA said the drugs could bring in peak annual sales of $3 billion to $4 billion combined.
Verso’s Eugene, whose firm owns shares in GSK, said it would need to navigate competitive threats to neladalkib to capture market share particularly from Pfizer’s Lorbrena and Roche’s Alecensa – all of which target the ALK mutation.
The deal also adds an early-stage HER2 lung cancer drug and several cancer programmes still in lab-testing stages to GSK’s pipeline.
The deal, expected to close in the third quarter of 2026, will be funded mainly from new and existing debt facilities plus cash and could result in a low single-digit percentage dilution to core earnings per share between 2026 and 2028, GSK said.
(Reporting by DhanushVignesh Babu and Yadarisa Shabong in Bengaluru and Bhanvi Satija in London; Editing by Mrigank Dhaniwala, Louise Heavens, Susan Fenton and Tomasz Janowski)
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