Jazz Pharma to buy GW Pharmaceuticals in a $7.2 billion cash-and-stock deal

Jazz Pharmaceuticals Plc said on Wednesday it had agreed to buy GW Pharmaceuticals plc in a $7.2 billion cash-and-stock deal which will bolster its neuroscience business with the addition of a cannabis-based epilepsy treatment.
 

GW Pharma's Epidiolex, the first marijuana-derived drug to be approved in the United States, generated sales of over $500 million for the U.K.-based company last year. Analysts expect sales to breach $1 billion soon.
 

The drug was approved in June 2018 for use in patients aged two years and older with rare childhood-onset forms of epilepsy that are among the most resistant to treatment. It has