Dive Brief:
- Johnson & Johnson has agreed to acquire V-Wave, the maker of an implantable device to treat heart failure, in a deal worth up to $1.7 billion.
- J&J will pay $600 million upfront, plus potential additional payments up to about $1.1 billion if regulatory and commercial milestones are met, the company said Tuesday. J&J expects the acquisition to close before the end of the year.
- V-Wave’s device, known as the Ventura Interatrial Shunt, is designed to reduce elevated left atrial pressure in people with congestive heart failure by creating a shunt between the left and right atrium. It received the Food and Drug Administration’s breakthrough device designation in 2019 and Europe’s CE mark in 2020. J&J said the device could be the first of its kind to reach the market.
Dive Insight:
With the addition of privately held V-Wave, J&J continues to build its cardiovascular device portfolio, after spending $16.6 billion to acquire Abiomed in 2022 and $13.1 billion to purchase Shockwave Medical earlier this year.
The company also bought Laminar, maker of a left atrial appendage closure treatment, for $400 million in November.
“[J&J’s] vision of leveraging MedTech and Innovative Medicine for cardiovascular diseases continues taking shape,” RBC Capital Markets analyst Shagun Singh said in a Tuesday note to clients. The company is looking at different mechanisms of heart disease and how devices and therapeutics can improve the standard of care, Singh wrote.
The V-Wave device is intended for people who have heart failure with reduced ejection fraction, when the heart muscle does not pump blood to the body with enough force.
J&J, which invested in V-Wave in 2016, estimated the technology could help about 800,000 people in the U.S. each year who have reduced ejection fraction.
The device, placed in the heart through a catheter-based procedure, has the potential to fill a treatment gap between medical therapies and highly invasive cardiac replacement procedures such as left ventricular assist device implantation and heart transplant, J&J said.
J&J expects the addition of V-Wave will accelerate its shift into high-growth markets and deepen its relationships with structural interventional cardiologists and heart failure specialists, the company said.
At deal closing, J&J will record an in-process research and development charge of about $600 million, J&J said. The company expects the deal to dilute adjusted earnings per share by about 24 cents in 2024 and 6 cents in 2025.
Once the deal is completed, Michael Bodner, J&J’s head of heart recovery and intravascular lithotripsy, will lead the team at V-Wave, which will be folded into J&J’s medtech unit.