Abstract

Staring down a future without the lucrative arthritis treatment Humira, AbbVie has responded with a deal to acquire Allergan for $63 billion. Humira has long dominated lists of the drug industry’s best sellers, bringing in nearly $20 billion in annual sales. Growing US sales of Humira have offset a decline in other markets, where generic versions of the antibody therapy were launched last fall. But the drug will lose patent protection in the US in 2023, and AbbVie has been under pressure to fill the large hole that loss will create. Acquiring Allergan will add almost $16 billion in annual sales, bringing AbbVie’s sales to about $49 billion and making it, for now, the fourth-largest drugmaker, after Johnson & Johnson, Roche, and Pfizer. In explaining AbbVie’s thinking behind the deal, CEO Richard A. Gonzalez said the company was planning for the future. “There are a whole range of outcomes that

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