Novartis buys Avidity Biosciences for $12 billion

Milan – Novartis has announced an agreement to acquire U.S. biotech company Avidity Biosciences, a company specializing in rare diseases, confirming Bloomberg 's forecast. Avidity shares rose 1.2% to $49.15 in New York trading on Friday, giving the company a market capitalization of $6.8 billion.

Novartis will pay Avidity shareholders $72 per share in cash, a 46% premium to last Friday's closing price. The transaction is expected to close in the first half of 2026, after Avidity spins off certain businesses. "The Avidity team has built a robust program in RNA muscle therapies," CEO Vas Narasimhan said in a statement. "We look forward to building on these programs and changing the trajectory of patients' diseases."

Following the announcement of the deal, Novartis raised its revenue growth forecast from 5% to 6% annually for the period between 2024 and 2029.

If completed, this would be the largest acquisition by the Swiss multinational in over a decade and the second in just a few months, following the purchase of Tourmaline Bio Inc. in September, valued at approximately €1.4 billion.

The Avidity deal, expected to be valued at more than $10 billion, will be Novartis' largest acquisition under CEO Vas Narasimhan and follows a wave of biotech M&A by large companies snapping up smaller, more innovative companies in an effort to maintain revenues. The Avidity acquisition would allow Novartis to offset the impending expiration of some patents by adding the biotech company's drugs for muscular dystrophy, a potentially fatal disease that causes muscle atrophy, to its portfolio.