The third quarter of 2021 was an active one for M&A with 52 new deals announced amounting to over $207 billion. Third quarter M&A activity however did not eclipse what we saw in the prior quarter with 59 new deals announced in Q2 2021 with a total value of a little over $214 billion. The highlight of the third quarter, however, was the number of potential deals in the works announced. We added 34 potential deals to our list of deals in the works and seven of them were successful within the same quarter.
One of the seven successful potential deals was the acquisition of Acceleron Pharma (XLRN) by Merck (MRK) for $10.8 billion. We added Acceleron Pharma to our list of potential deals on September 27, 2021, when Bloomberg reported that the company was in advanced discussions to be acquired by a large pharmaceutical company. Bristol-Myers Squibb (BMY) which owns over 10% of company stock was expected to be a strong competing candidate. The price of XLRN went up to $178.87 from $167.75 after the announcement. Three days later, on September 30, 2021 XLRN and MRK entered into a definitive agreement, under which Merck, through a subsidiary, will acquire Acceleron for $180 per share in cash.
Acceleron was founded in June 2003, by a group of scientists in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The company was formed to discover and develop drugs based on transforming growth factors (TGF)-beta superfamily of proteins in metabolic disorders like obesity, diabetes, osteoporosis, and muscle-wasting conditions.
Acceleron has four drugs in clinical trials.