9th Feb 2019 13:03
LONDON (Alliance News) - Smith & Nephew PLC is discussions to acquire US surgical instruments maker NuVasive Inc, the Financial Times reported Friday, in a deal the newspaper said could be worth more than USD3 billion.
https://www.ft.com/content/3b5caa08-2be0-11e9-88a4-c32129756dd8
NASDAQ-listed NuVasive closed down 1.9% on Friday, giving it a market capitalisation of USD2.55 billion, but spiked 18% in US after-hours trading after the FT article was published.
FTSE 100 constituent S&N closed down 1.9% in London on Friday, giving it a market cap of GBP13.27 billion.
San Diego, California-based NuVasive makes equipment for spinal surgery, as well as bone implants. The FT cited "people with direct knowledge of the talks". It said the exact terms of the discussions could not be learned and talks may still fall apart.
It noted that NuVasive has debt of about USD500 million.
The FT said S&N declines to comment and NuVasive said it "does not comment on market speculation or rumours".
On Thursday, S&N posted strong annual results, with all three of its franchises showing increased revenue, ahead of its Ceterix Orthopaedics Inc acquisition, which will increase the size of the biggest of those divisions.
The medical device maker's revenue for the year was USD4.90 billion, up from USD4.77 billion the year before. This matched the company-compiled consensus of USD4.91 billion.
Within the revenue figure Sports Medicine, Trauma & Other - Smith & Nephew's biggest franchise - recorded USD2.00 billion of revenue in 2018, rising 3.6% from USD1.93 billion in 2017. S&N's other two francises are Reconstruction and Advanced Wound Management.
Smith & Nephew announced its intention to acquire Ceterix Orthopaedics in the final quarter of 2018 and it closed the deal, which has a maximum USD105 million consideration, last month. An acquisition of NuVasive would be of an entirely different scale.
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