With Abbott ($ABT) spinning off its pharmaceutical division, I’m looking forward to see what the clever marketing folks come up with as the new name for the Humira heavy entity. Back in 2004, they split off their hospital-based business and called it Hospira ($HSP). Not super-original – guessing that “Hospitalia” didn’t make muster (doesn’t that just sound wrong?) – nor tremendously value generating, if you never sold your shares: $HSP closed at $27.04 on May 3, 2004, and $30.65 yesterday. Wonder if any (mutual) funds are have held on to $HSP from the beginning.
Yes, a lot of crazy macro-economic factors have played into that valuation, but acute and hospital sales based Cubist ($CBST) and speciality pharma Shire ($SHPGY) seemed to have fared well over the same time period. And, of course, I cherry-picked the names, but why compare against the weak?
Source: Yahoo! Finance, 10/25/11
The reason for this (silly) post, is to lend support and/or propose a name for the new entity – I’m sure people joked about it back in 2004 and perhaps, it continues to be fodder today – but, I like “Costello” Pharmaceuticals. Why not? We have the conservative, staid businesses of branded generics, devices, diagnostics, and nutritionals in Abbott, the straight-faced half of our infamous Abbott & Costello duo, and the unpredictable pharma business in Costello, the lovable, unpredictable half of the team.
Wouldn’t it be great if “Costello” could shout out “Heeyyyy….Aaaaboottt” at some point during an investor call, or have someone compare the two companies in seven years’ time and think, “Who’s (on) First?”.
I say, c’mon, let’s make it fun for those who enjoy following the biopharma world! It sure beats trying to figure out the rest of October’s “A-list” and make sense of Roche’s interest (by valuation) in Anadys ($ANDS) and $CBST’s acquistion of Adolor ($ADLR; though to be fair, I can see some value there with Entereg). Now, if only Spectrum ($SPPI) would only step up and acquire Allos ($ALTH), we could start the “B’s” in November…or, perhaps, the “C’s”.
Here’s to emailing (does he Tweet?) Richard Gonzales and voicing support for Costello Pharmaceuticals.
FeedingBiotech 