Sandoz family to get $2.9 billion from offloading part of its Novartis stake

ZURICH (Reuters) - The investment vehicle of the Sandoz family will get 2.6 billion Swiss francs ($2.90 billion) from selling a chunk of Swiss pharma giant Novartis, the bookrunner on the deal said on Wednesday.

Emasan AG sold 26.5 million shares at a price of 98.25 Swiss francs in an accelerated bookbuilt offering, Goldman Sachs said.

The family foundation did not respond to a request for comment.

According to LSEG data, the Sandoz family was the third biggest shareholder in Novartis with a stake of 4.1%. This placed them behind BlackRock with 6.4% and UBS with 5.3%.

Novartis said the stake being sold by Emasan corresponded to roughly 1% of its outstanding shares.

"The vast majority of our shareholders are institutional investors with a long-term view, and we expect this to continue," a Novartis spokesperson said.

Sandoz was one of the two predecessor companies of Novartis. The pharmaceutical giant emerged in 1996 from the merger of the company with the pharmaceutical and chemical group Ciba-Geigy.

($1 = 0.8951 Swiss francs)

(Reporting by Alexander Hubner and Oliver Hirt, writing by John Revill; Editing by Sharon Singleton)