The European Commission (EC) has initiated a Phase II investigation of Bayer’s proposed $66-billion acquisition of Monsanto, a St. Louis, Missouri-headquartered agrochemical and seed company.

In September 2016, Bayer finalized a proposed acquisition of Monsanto. The move was the first-large scale acquisition by Bayer since becoming a pure-play life sciences company with a focus on pharmaceuticals, consumer healthcare, and crop science.

With 2016 sales in its life-sciences business of approximately EUR 37 billion ($44 billion), Bayer’s focus on life sciences is being led by Werner Baumann, who became chairman of the board of management of Bayer AG on May 1, 2016, succeeding Marijn Dekkers. Bayer took on a new corporate structure in January 2016 with three divisions: pharmaceuticals, consumer healthcare, and crop science, and a separate business unit, animal health. Bayer’s former Material Science subgroup, renamed Covestro, became legally and economically independent on September 1, 2015, and Covestro AG was floated on the stock market in October 2015.

Bayer and Monsanto notified the transaction to the EC on June 30, 2017, and submitted commitments on July 31, 2017. Bayer says it is working to obtain the EC approval of the transaction by the end of 2017.

Source: Bayer