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Despite persistent macroeconomic and geopolitical pressures, 2025 marked a pivotal shift in life sciences dealmaking: fewer transactions, but significantly higher deal values as companies prioritized quality, late stage assets, and strategic focus.
After an already subdued 2024, dealmaking activity across the life sciences sector declined further in 2025 as ongoing macroeconomic headwinds, market volatility, and regulatory uncertainty continued to temper risk appetite. The total number of publicly disclosed deals fell 12% year over year, reflecting a cautious environment for mergers and acquisitions, licensing, and collaborative R&D.
Yet beneath this slowdown, deal values surged. M&A spend nearly doubled as companies pursued fewer but higher impact transactions, with nine acquisitions exceeding US$10 billion. Licensing activity followed a similar pattern, with volumes down but fees holding firm as dealmakers concentrated on de risked, late stage assets aligned to core growth priorities. Meanwhile, collaborative R&D alliances reached a five year low as biopharma players narrowed their therapeutic focus and invested selectively in innovation.
Drawing on IQVIA’s comprehensive global Pharma Deals database, this annual review examines the key forces shaping deal activity in 2025, and what they signal for dealmaking strategies in the year ahead.
In this report, IQVIA experts explore:
Gain data driven insight into global life sciences deal activity, valuations, and strategic trends, powered by IQVIA Pharma Deals, the industry’s most comprehensive source of publicly disclosed deal intelligence.
Go beyond the numbers to analytics-driven insights using artificial intelligence, machine learning and healthcare expertise.