Eli Lilly will acquire neuroscience specialist Centessa Pharmaceuticals in a deal worth up to $7.8bn, solidifying the drugmaker’s status as one of the most dominant players in the pharma deals arena so far this year.
As per the takeover deal, Lilly will acquire UK-based Centessa for $38 a share, representing a 37% premium on the Nasdaq closing price of $27.58 on 30 March. Despite the front-loaded nature of the deal, Centessa could also receive an additional $9 per share in contingent value rights (CVR).
Whether that extra $1.5bn in CVR is added to the deal hinges on three milestones for cleminorexton, Centessa’s lead candidate. The asset, formerly known as ORX750, has already demonstrated positive results in Phase II studies across a range of sleep-wake cycle conditions, including narcolepsy type 1, narcolepsy type 2, and idiopathic hypersomnia.
In a research note following the deal, Citi analysts commented: “We think this could be an impactful expansion of Lilly's neuroscience portfolio, given the large collective total addressable market across the three indications.”
The Lilly acquisition will reach its full value if the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approves the drug for the treatment of narcolepsy type 2 or idiopathic hypersomnia within five years of the deal closing, as well as an approval in any other indication before 2030.
The British biotech’s portfolio is made up of orexin receptor 2 (OX2R) agonists, proteins that help regulate the sleep-wake cycle. This means that daytime sleepiness, also known as narcolepsy, and wakeful disorders are firmly in Centessa’s therapeutic crosshairs. The company’s other clinical candidate is ORX142, which produced positive improvements in sleep latency in a Phase I trial (NCT07082829) in healthy volunteers in November 2025.
Carole Ho, Lilly Neuroscience’s president, said: "Orexin receptor biology represents one of the most compelling mechanistic opportunities in neuroscience as a direct intervention on the master switch of the sleep-wake cycle. Centessa has assembled a portfolio with the breadth and depth to improve wakefulness across a broad array of indications.”
According to a narcolepsy market report by Pharmaceutical Technology’s parent company, GlobalData, the number of diagnosed prevalent cases of the disease is set to reach over 760,000 by 2029 across the 16 major pharmaceutical markets (16MM: Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Russia, South Africa, South Korea, Spain, the UK, and the US). Jazz Pharmaceuticals’ Xyrem (sodium oxybate) is one of the top-selling products in this area, indicated for excessive daytime sleepiness (EDS) in patients with narcolepsy.
For Lilly, the agreement to buy Centessa firmly places the drugmaker near the top of the pharma M&A and collaboration deals leaderboard so far in 2026. Lilly inked a deal to acquire inflammatory disease specialist Ventyx Biosciences for $1.2bn in January, with another acquisition agreement with Orna Therapeutics for $2.4bn coming in February. The largest of the collaboration deals came via the $8.8bn pact with China-based Innovent to develop new cancer and immune disorder therapies in February. Other biotechs involved in multi-billion-dollar partnerships agreed with Lilly this year include Seamless Therapeutics, Nimbus Therapeutics, Repertoire Immune Medicines, and Insilico Medicine.
