Andre Hoffman, vice chairman of Roche and spokesman for the family group of shareholders (own 45.01%), says Roche is NOT for sale to Novartis or anyone else.
PharmaGossip: Roche will not be for sale, vice chairman tells newspaper | Reuters.
The issue arose when one of the famly pool members, Maja Oeri, decided to exercise her shares independently. Some believe this could make the company vunerable to takeover -- and Novartis is a likely suspect as it owns a third of the voting rights and tried to do so previously in 2004.
Hoffman however dismisses the prospect. He says that the Roche strategy and business model do not match Novartis'. He says "a fusion of Roche and Novartis makes even less sense than it did five or ten years ago."
Posted by Bruce Lehr March 29th 2011.
Comments