2023-05-09 15:23:46 ET
The Federal Trade Commission is investigating IQVIA Holdings ( NYSE: IQV ) planned purchase of Propel Media, which owns an advertising tech company used by many drugmakers.
IQVIA is paying $700M-$800M for Propel Media, which owns DeepIntent, Politico reported. The newspaper's reporting is the first time the deal has been revealed, as well as the first time the FTC's investigation has come to light.
The deal was apparently brokered last year.
At issue is whether the deal would allow IQVIA ( IQV ) to dominate the market for pharma digital advertising to doctors and patients.
IQVIA is known as a pharma data and analytics company. That data can be used by drugmakers to assess potential demand for medications.
Politico reported that DeepIntent does business with pharmaceutical companies to help market their drugs to doctors and patients, as well as measure and improve ad campaigns.
Th FTC is also looking in to how DeepIntent, in combination with IQVIA's omnichannel healthcare marketing and analytics platform, Lasso, as well as IQVIA's huge amount of pharma industry data could potentially monopolize pharma advertising.
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IQVIA under FTC investigation over digital ads acquisition - Politico