CSL pays Talecris $75M, scraps merger deal

Australian vaccine maker CSL and Talecris Biotherapeutics have called a halt to a proposed $3.1 billion merger after running straight into a posse of U.S. antitrust regulators.

CSL said that the cost and enormous effort required to duke it out with the Federal Trade Commission made it impossible to complete the merger. But CSL is handing over a $75 million breakup fee to the Research Triangle Park-based biotech and will live up to the terms of a plasma supply contract they signed.

Regulators challenged the deal, saying it would unfairly limit competition in the market for plasma-derivative protein therapies. "We are disappointed that the U.S. Federal Trade Commission resolved to block the transaction," CSL CEO Dr. Brian McNamee said in a statement. "As we have previously stated, we fundamentally disagree with the FTC case."

- read the report from Reuters

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