![\"genzyme\"](\"http:\/\/s.wsj.net\/public\/resources\/images\/MK-AW702_GENZYM_D_20090616201451.jpg\")
Activist Carl Icahn has shown a continued interest in the biotech industry, building on his view that Big Pharma wants to spend its cash piles on acquiring the smaller companies.<\/p>\nActivist Carl Icahn has shown a continued interest in the biotech industry, building on his view that Big Pharma wants to spend its cash piles on acquiring the smaller companies.<\/p>\n
But his latest effort, to gain board seats at beleaguered Genzyme, may face a substantial snag from antitrust laws, at least to Genzyme’s way of thinking. Two of Icahn’s four nominees to Genzyme’s board already serve as directors at Biogen Idec. Antitrust rules usually prohibit directors from serving at competing companies. <\/p>\n
The biotech companies, both of which are based in Cambridge, Mass., already have some product overlap and are heading for more, based on their development programs. Icahn owns a 6% stake in Biogen and a 1.8% stake in Genzyme. For more on the Icahn stake and Genezyme’s bout with production woes, see here<\/a> and here<\/a>.<\/p>\n The potential for overlapping directors at competing companies could hurt Icahn’s proxy efforts, especially since that’s one factor proxy advisory firms review in recommending how large shareholders should vote the shares they hold. One of the major advisory firms, Glass Lewis, concedes that potential conflicts from nominees pose a \u0093pretty substantial hurdle\u0094 for it to support a dissident slate in a proxy fight. <\/p>\n The overlapping problem came up last year with Google and Apple, when each company had directors resign after the FTC began looking at two members sitting on both boards. <\/p>\n Now, Genzyme officials have begun to raise the issue with shareholders as the May 20 vote on directors approaches. Genzyme contends that the two companies’ blood-cancer products already meet the FTC’s theshold that would prohibit overlapping directors. Also, Genzyme and Biogen are heading toward increased competition in coming years based on Genzyme’s efforts in multiple sclerosis, which are in Biogen’s wheelhouse, and a continued focus on various types of blood cancers.<\/p>\n A Biogen spokeswoman declined to comment other than to say that the company’s board “has a process to address conflicts that arise.” Officials from Icahn’s office also declined to comment. You can read more on the situation here<\/a>.<\/p>\n Photo: Associated Pres<\/em><\/p>\n Activist Carl Icahn has shown a continued interest in the biotech industry, building on his view that Big Pharma wants to spend its cash piles on acquiring the smaller companies. But his latest effort, to gain board seats at beleaguered Genzyme, may face a substantial snag from antitrust laws, at least to Genzyme’s way of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-519908","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/519908","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=519908"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/519908\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=519908"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=519908"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=519908"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<\/img><\/a>
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