EU orders Illumina to pay $476M fine over unapproved Grail deal

Il­lu­mi­na must pay a €432 mil­lion ($476 mil­lion) fine for buy­ing the can­cer-test­ing firm Grail with­out reg­u­la­to­ry ap­proval, the Eu­ro­pean Com­mis­sion said to­day.

The San Diego-based com­pa­ny closed the deal in 2021 de­spite the EU’s on­go­ing an­titrust in­ves­ti­ga­tion. More than a year lat­er, the bloc told Il­lu­mi­na to un­wind the trans­ac­tion, but has yet to is­sue a for­mal di­vesti­ture or­der.

“EU merg­er rules re­quire that merg­ing com­pa­nies not to im­ple­ment merg­ers un­til ap­proved by the Com­mis­sion (“the stand­still oblig­a­tion”),” said the EU in a state­ment. “It is a cor­ner­stone of the Eu­ro­pean merg­er con­trol sys­tem, that en­ables the Com­mis­sion to car­ry-out its role be­fore struc­tur­al changes mod­i­fy the com­pet­i­tive land­scape.”

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