S.Korea’s SK to buy US bio JV stake from Roivant for $48 mn

SK Group, South Korea’s second-largest conglomerate, is set to purchase the entire stake in a US bio joint venture held by its partner, as the group seeks a future-growth engine in the biopharmaceuticals industry.

SK Biopharmaceuticals Co., the group’s drug-developing subsidiary, said on Friday it decided to buy a 60% stake in ProteoVant Sciences Inc. for $47.5 million.

ProteoVant was a JV established in January 2021 with Switzerland-based Roivant Sciences holding 60% and SK Inc. having 40%. The South Korean group’s holding company invested $200 million in the partnership with Roivant.

The acquisition is expected to allow SK Biopharmaceuticals to obtain world-class targeted protein degradation (TPD) technology, which decomposes proteins that cause diseases, the company said.

TO SECURE WORLD-CLASS TPD TECHNOLOGY

“TPD technology is recognized as one of the sectors with the greatest potential,” said SK Biopharmaceuticals CFO Jung Jiyoung in a conference call.

“Through the takeover, we have secured world-class TPD platform-related technology and research bases.”

SK Group, which operates its own contract development and manufacturing organization (CDMO) business for pharmaceuticals, aims to develop its own next-generation medicines.

The group is working to achieve that goal through acquisitions instead of the traditional drug development method, in which drug candidate discovery and approvals can take years.

Write to Ji-Eun Ha at hazzys@hankyung.com
 
Jongwoo Cheon edited this article.