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Mankind Pharma has acquired a 70% stake in Belgium-based Armed Cell Therapeutics (ACTx) for €48 million (₹511 crore).
ACTx is a biotechnology company developing next-generation CAR-T therapies, which use a patient’s own immune cells to fight cancer.
Why it matters: the deal marks Mankind’s entry into CAR-T cancer therapies and supports its push to develop innovative medicines for global markets.
How the treatment works: CAR-T therapy modifies a patient’s immune cells to help them recognise and attack cancer cells.
It has improved treatment for some blood cancers, but patients can relapse. The modified cells may stop working effectively or may not survive long enough, and cancer cells can find ways to evade them.
The acquisition, made through Mankind’s Netherlands subsidiary, gives it access to cell-therapy research capabilities and potential treatments under development for non-Hodgkin lymphoma, a type of blood cancer, and small-cell lung cancer.
It also expands Mankind’s presence in Europe beyond selling medicines into biotechnology research and development.
Big picture: global spending on cancer medicines reached $252 billion in 2024 and is forecast to exceed $400 billion by 2028, according to the IQVIA Institute, with the United States accounting for roughly 46% of the total.That helps explain the attraction for Mankind: it is building research capabilities in a category where spending is expected to grow sharply.
