The world’s largest CRO and one of the biggest healthcare data and consulting firms have become one major $19 billion 50,000-strong company this week as QuintilesIMS comes into life.
Announced with some surprise to the market back in May, the deal sees NC-based Quintiles merge with Danbury-headquartered IMS Health, although the union is not one of exact equals, as IMS owns slightly more of the combined shares of the new company than Quintiles does.
On top of this, the dual chair and CEO is taken by Ari Bousbib, who was the chief of IMS Health before the merger.
But the ticker symbol $Q, previously used just for Quintiles, has become the new co’s ticker, and Quintiles has been allowed to go first in the naming stakes.
The company said that shares of IMS Health were halted from trading this week on the NYSE as it trades under the new entity.
QuintilesIMS has launched with a new website and corporate video as it looks to consolidate and explain its new company after the markets reacted fairly negatively to the merger when first announced.
The new company merges the real-world clinical applications of Quintiles’ business with IMS Health’s data gathering and analysis, as well as its access to patient, prescription and other key healthcare data, giving the new company a pool of information for drugmakers.
It will also likely encroach deeply into the offerings of Quintiles' main big CRO, North Carolina rivals, which have also been looking to expand into consulting, digital and analytics in recent years.