BRIEF—Group of Takeda shareholders band together against Shire deal

A group of shareholders including several founding family members of Japan’s Takeda Pharmaceutical have banded together to try to derail the Japanese group’s £46 billion ($64 million at time of announcement) acquisition of Shire, blasting the deal as “the height of madness,” according to a Financial Times report this morning.

The dissidents hold just over 1% of Takeda’s stock, giving them little actual power to overturn the planned takeover of the Irish rare diseases specialist.

But their offensive has drawn outsized attention in a country where founding family voices can hold emotional sway over the votes of mom-and-pop investors, who account for a quarter of Takeda’s shareholders.

The founding family members together own an estimated 10% of the 237-year-old drugmaker, the FT noted.