Horizon Discovery rejects £270m takeover proposal from Abcam

Horizon secured an unsolicited and highly conditional proposal from Abcam.

Abcam has offered £1.81 per Horizon share, which represents a premium of only 25.7% to its share on 1 May and 9.9% to its three-month volume-weighted average price of £1.65 to 1 May.

Horizon also noted that the offer represents a discount of 1.5% to its six-month volume-weighted average price of £1.84 to 1 May.

Horizon’s board is expecting that its gene editing and modulation technologies, RNAi research tools and gene editing research tools, services and leveraged research programmes will deliver better growth in the near and long term, in addition to creating significant value for shareholders, customers and employees.

The company said it will release its preliminary results for the year ended 31 December 2017 on 8 May, and confirmed that its trading is in line with expectations

Jonathan Milner, who is a director and shareholder of both Abcam and Horizon Discovery Group, has not been involved in discussions regarding proposal.

Horizon is engaged in the designing and development of DNA editing tools by using its translational genomics platform.

The company acquired Dharmacon to add its functional genomics platform with gene knockdown (RNAi) and gene expression (cDNA, ORF) tools, which can be used for research and clinical applications that advance human health.

Horizon Discovery's platforms and capabilities will help researchers to change any gene or modulate its function in human or mammalian cell-lines.

The company provides a range of catalogue products and related research services to help understand function of genes across all species and genetic drivers of human disease, as well as development of personalised molecular, cell and gene therapies.

Horizon’s products and research services were adopted by more than 10,000 academic, drug discovery, drug manufacturing and clinical diagnostics customers across the globe.