Johnson & Johnson to acquire Ambrx in $2 billion deal

Johnson & Johnson
JNJ,
-0.54%

announced Monday that it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Ambrx Biopharma Inc.
AMAM,
+98.79%.
The all-cash merger transaction has a total equity value of approximately $2 billion, or $1.9 billion net of estimated cash acquired, Johnson & Johnson said. Ambrx is a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company with a proprietary synthetic biology technology platform to design and develop next-generation antibody-drug conjugates, or ADCs. Johnson & Johnson shares fell 0.5% Monday in premarket trading, while Ambrx shares climbed 28.8%. Johnson & Johnson’s stock is down 8.2% over the past 52 weeks, compared to the S&P 500 index.
SPX,
+0.51%

gain of 20.6%. Ambrx stock has soared 542.9% over the past 52 weeks.