Vectura’s board faced criticism after it backed a takeover offer from the maker of Marlboro cigarettes.
The decision sparked outrage among the UK’s medical chiefs and physicians who were shocked that the inhaler maker, which helps people with respiratory problems, could succumb to US tobacco giant, Philip Morris International (PMI).
City grandee Lord Myners last night also condemned the deal, branding it a ‘garage sale’ and saying the bid saga ‘stank’.
Appalled: City grandee Lord Myners, a former chairman at Marks & Spencer, branded the Vectura deal a ‘garage sale’, saying the bid saga ‘stank’
Vectura’s board accepted the offer on financial grounds as it values the firm at £1.02billion. This is more than a bid of £958million from US private equity firm Carlyle.
Myners is a former chairman at Marks & Spencer who saved the company from falling into the hands of Philip Green.
He said the chairman and directors of Vectura should never have engaged with either of the takeover offers.
‘The board should have rejected the first offers, instead they put their head in the noose. Boards in this country lack stomach to produce better long term value.
It is a fact of life now, any UK cash offer [at a premium] above 30 per cent and the investment banks tell the board to accept. Game over.’
He added: ‘It doesn’t happen in other countries. It’s like a garage sale. We are selling off our scientific leadership. It’s a tragedy and the Government just watches as all our scientific knowledge is bought up.’
Founded in 1997 by students from the University of Bath, Vectura is one of the UK’s leading science companies.
Philip Morris wants to get its hands on the firm to transform itself into a ‘health and wellness’ firm. Sarah Woolnough, chief executive of Asthma UK and the British Lung Foundation, said they were ‘extremely shocked and concerned’.
She added: ‘PMI makes billions from making addictive products that can cause and exacerbate lung diseases. It’s totally absurd that they could make more money from providing treatments to the very people they have made ill in the first place.’
Vectura shareholders will vote on the deal on August 24.
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