There’s a new healthcare giant on the London Stock Exchange: Separated from its parent company GSK, Haleon went public on Monday, with a valuation of £30bn and a share price of 330p.
GSK wanted to see in this new structure the beginning of a “new era and a new goal”. “Now we are 100% focused on innovation in biopharmaceuticals”, underlines the group.
The initial public offering is the largest on the London Stock Exchange since 2011 and trader Glencore. At noon, the security was worth 316 pence, 3.14% less than its introductory level. GSK shares fell almost 20% to 1,379.80 pence.
Offer rejected at 50 billion
However, Unilever had made a purchase attempt for 50,000 million pounds in January, rejected by GSK, which considered it insufficient. Flagship project of Emma Walmsley, who took the helm of GSK in 2017 and has been under pressure from activist investors for more than a year, Haleon is supposed to drive sales growth for the lab, which will now focus on biopharmaceuticals.
On Monday, the shareholders of GSK, which owns 68% of this entity, received one Haleon share for each share held by the British laboratory. GSK will also have to receive at the time of the split more than 7,000 million pounds of dividends from its subsidiary, of which it will retain 6% initially, before gradually disassociating itself.
US pharmaceutical giant Pfizer, which owns the remaining 32%, has indicated it will eventually withdraw from the company to focus on its own “innovative drugs and vaccines” strategy.
In fact, GSK’s share has only increased by 6% in the last 5 years, while rival Astrazeneca’s has more than doubled. The latter was notably one of the first laboratories to launch a vaccine against Covid-19, while GlaxoSmithKline lagged far behind. GSK, in particular, will look to rely on niche drugs, in support of a sales growth ambition of more than 5% this year.
Source: BFM TV
