The San Francisco Chronicle is reporting that a special committee of Genentech’s board is not surprisingly “disappointed” with the hostile buyout offer from Swiss pharma giant Roche. This means that the eight-month stalemate between the two companies over Roche’s planned takeover still has a ways to go, and the fate 500 employee-plant in Oceanside that manufactures Genentech’s blockbuster cancer drug, Avastin, will remain uncertain.
Roche and the board of the San Francisco-based biotech have been haggling over the per-share price Roche will pay since July. In September, we wrote about how the employees might be affected by the takeover. And since then, we’ve been keeping an eye on the takeover bid.
Earlier this month, Roche lost patience and went hostile — dropping its bid from $44 billion to $42 billion. Predictably, the Genentech board said this was a bad deal for shareholders. From the Chronicle story:
“We are disappointed that Roche has chosen not to consider an appropriate price range for Genentech’s minority shares or to constructively negotiate with our committee,” Dr. Charles Sanders, chair of the special committee, wrote, “and we must recommend that stockholders not tender their shares as a result.”
The Chronicle story went on to say that Analysts are predicting Roche will increase its bid.