The American pharmaceutical group Eli Lilly has signed an agreement for the purchase of Merida Biosciences for a maximum value of 2.875 billion dollars (2.482 billion euros), a cash operation that combines an initial payment with additional installments linked to the achievement of certain milestones.
The acquisition, still conditioned on the fulfillment of the usual closing clauses, is expected to be completed in the fourth quarter of 2026 and will allow Lilly to strengthen its portfolio of treatments aimed at autoimmune diseases and severe allergies.
According to the company, Merida is working on the development of biological therapies aimed at selectively degrading pathogenic autoantibodies, responsible for multiple immune-mediated disorders. With this precision degradation approach, the biotechnology company aims to attack the biological origin of these pathologies, instead of resorting to the widespread suppression of the immune system that many of the therapies available today offer.
"Merida's main program is designed precisely for that: to selectively and directly eliminate the autoantibodies that cause Graves' disease and thyroid eye disease, while preserving normal immune function," commented Francisco Ramírez-Valle, senior vice president of immunological research and early clinical development at Lilly.
"We see potential to apply this precision approach to a wide range of antibody-mediated diseases, and we look forward to advancing this novel technology in collaboration with the Merida team," he added.