Royalty Pharma has increased its offer to buy Irish pharmaceutical business Elan to $12 per share, an offer that values the developer of multiple sclerosis drug Tysabri at $7.3bn.
The US investment firm issued a takeover bid of $11 per Elan share on February 25, but the offer was rejected for having a "heavily conditional nature".
The fresh offer was made ahead of the 10 May deadline, which Elan imposed on Royalty earlier this month.
Elan investors have 60 days to decide whether to accept the offer, but the Irish firm has given no indication as to whether it will accept the bid and has failed to engage in constructive dialogue with Royalty regarding the takeover, the US company said in a statement.
"Royalty Pharma is disappointed that the board of Elan has not engaged with it or allowed it to conduct a limited and customary due diligence review. As a result, Royalty Pharma has been forced to make its offer solely on the basis of publicly available information," the statement continued.
The takeover offer follows Elan’s announcement earlier this year that it had sold Tysabri to Biogen Idec for $3.25bn.
Commenting on the bid, Pablo Legorreta, CEO of RP Management said; "Based on our analysis of Elan’s Tysabri royalty and the implied valuation of Elan’s economics in Tysabri reflected in Elan’s recent transaction with Biogen, we believe that our offer represents a full and fair value for Elan.
"We remain hopeful that the board of Elan will consider our offer and recommend it to its shareholders. In order to obtain the full amount of our offer in cash in the shortest time frame, Elan’s shareholders should encourage Elan’s board to engage immediately with Royalty Pharma."
Royalty Pharma said it would finance the offer through existing resources and new credit facilities. Its advisers are JPMorgan, BofA Merrill Lynch and Groton Partners.
