Ropes & Gray Advises Pfizer in its Acquisition of Arena Pharmaceuticals

Ropes & Gray advised Pfizer Inc. in its definitive agreement to acquire Arena Pharmaceuticals, Inc. Under the terms of the agreement, Pfizer will acquire all the outstanding shares of Arena for $100 per share in an all-cash transaction for a total equity value of approximately $6.7 billion. The boards of directors of both companies have unanimously approved the transaction. The transaction was made public on Dec. 13 in a press release.

Area Pharmaceuticals is a clinical stage company developing innovative potential therapies for the treatment of several immuno-inflammatory diseases. Pfizer is  one of the world's premier innovative biopharmaceutical companies. 

The team that represented Pfizer was led by mergers & acquisitions partner Emily Oldshue (Boston), and included mergers & acquisitions partner Paul Kinsella (Boston), benefits partners Loretta Richard and Renata Ferrari (both of Boston), commercial & securities litigation partner Rocky Tsai (San Francisco), tax partner David Saltzman (Boston), real estate partner Peter Alpert (Boston), life sciences regulatory & compliance partner Joshua Oyster (Washington, D.C.), life sciences partner Amanda Austin (Boston), mergers & acquisitions counsel Aileen Kim (New York), health care counsel Leslie Thornton (San Francisco) and litigation & enforcement counsel Patrick Welsh (Boston).