On the July 2026 edition of the Scrip Deals Podcast, Scrip Senior Writer Joseph Haas and Bruce Leuchter, CEO of Neurvati Biosciences and GRIN Therapeutics, discussed the recent trend of biopharma M&amp;A deals valued at $1bn or greater closing quickly. Recent research showed that closing time for such deals is less than half of how long it took to close a billion-dollar acquisition during the span on 2023-2025.. Leuchter offered some insights on why this might be. Haas and Leuchter also discussed M&amp;A activity during the just-ended second quarter of 2026.

Scrip Deals Podcast, July 2026, with Dr. Bruce Leuchter

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Welcome to the July 2026 edition of the Scrip Deals Podcast. I'm Joe Haas, a senior writer with Scrip and the leader of Scrip's Deals coverage. Joining us this time is Dr. Bruce Leuchter, CEO of Nirvati Biosciences, a Blackstone Life Sciences portfolio company, and also CEO of Grin Therapeutics.

Bruce also brings a well-varied background to our discussion today as a neuropsychiatrist, a former analyst at Goldman Sachs, and a healthcare investment banker at Credit Suisse. Welcome, Bruce. Thanks, Joe. Pleased to be here. Thanks. I think your wealth of experience is going to serve us well in addressing today's topic.

2020-26 not only has been a busy year for biopharmaceutical M&A deals with high volume and five deals already valued at above $10 billion, but we've also noticed a trend. Acquisitions valued at $1 billion or greater are closing much more quickly than they have in recent years, and this trend appears to be continuing.

For Scrip, I track M&A deals in general, especially those priced at $1 billion and above. There have been 36 such of those by our count as of mid-July, and 12 of those 36 have closed. I fed some data into Claude AI recently because I had a sense closings were getting done more quickly than usual, and it turns out that trend is real.

We've seen an average closing time of 46 days this year from time of announcement to close for the $1 billion-plus deals that have been announced since the start of 2026. Nine of those 12 closed within a 28- to 48-day window, including one of the year's largest deals, GSK's $10.6 billion takeout of New Valent, which closed on July 15th, 36 days after it was announced.

Scrip Deals Podcast, July 2026, with Dr. Bruce Leuchter

Read the full transcript

The candid version is on a podcast,
not the earnings call.

Scrip Deals Podcast, July 2026, with Dr. Bruce Leuchter

Read the full transcript

The candid version is on a podcast, not the earnings call.

The candid version is on a podcast,
not the earnings call.