Sale of Vernalis R&D and Promacta License

12 Months Ended

Dec. 31, 2021

Discontinued Operations and Disposal Groups [Abstract]

Sale of Vernalis R&D and Promacta License

Sale of Vernalis R&D and Promacta License

Vernalis R&D

On October 11, 2020, we entered into an Agreement for the Sale and Purchase of the Entire Issued Share Capital of Vernalis (R&D) Limited (the “Purchase and Sale Agreement”) with HitGen UK Ltd (“Buyer”). Under the terms of the Purchase and Sale Agreement, we transferred certain intellectual property on completed collaboration licenses to Ligand UK Limited, which is a subsidiary of the Company, which we retain rights and interest to and are entitled to receive future milestones and royalties. Under the Purchase and Sale Agreement, we are also entitled to a share of the economic rights on current research collaboration contracts. In addition, Vernalis will continue to support certain existing Ligand partnerships. On December 2, 2020, we completed the sale. Pursuant to the terms of the Purchase and Sale Agreement, at the closing of the transaction, Buyer paid $26.7 million in cash, following adjustment for debt, cash and net working capital. As Vernalis R&D has the input, process and output elements defined in ASC 805, Business Combinations, we concluded the sale qualifies as a sale of business. Net assets sold, net of working capital adjustment, was $6.1 million, goodwill allocated to the selling business that was written off was $3.5 million, resulting in a $17.1 million gain from sale of Vernalis R&D recorded to income from operations.

Promacta License

On March 5, 2019, we entered into an Asset Purchase Agreement (the “Asset Purchase Agreement”) with RPI Finance Trust (“RPI”), doing business as “Royalty Pharma”, who is not an affiliate. Under the Asset Purchase Agreement, we sold, transferred, assigned and conveyed to RPI, and RPI purchased, acquired and accepted from us, all of our rights, title and interest in and to the Purchased Assets, which include among other things the intellectual property and related know-how generated by us in connection with the license agreement (collectively, the “Purchased Assets”), dated December 29, 1994, by and between Novartis (as successor in interest to SmithKline Beecham Corporation) and Ligand, which allowed us to receive a royalty on net sales of Promacta. We concluded the sale does not qualify as a sale of a business, but as a sale of a non-financial asset. At the closing on March 6, 2019, RPI paid us $827.0 million in cash and we do not have any remaining performance obligations related to Novartis or RPI for Promacta. The carrying value of our Promacta asset as of March 6, 2019 was zero. Of the total cash proceeds from the sale, $14.2 million was recorded to revenue related to the Promacta royalty for the period between January 1, 2019 and March 6, 2019, and the remaining $812.8 million was recorded to income from operations in accordance with ASC 610-20, Other Income - Gains and Losses from the Derecognition of Nonfinancial Assets.