EU antitrust regulators approved US drugmaker Eli Lilly’s $5.4 billion takeover of Swiss peer Novartis’s animal health business on Friday.

The European Commission said it was satisfied that the deal would not hinder competition and cleared it unconditionally.

The bid will allow Lilly to strengthen and diversify its Elanco unit and is one of several announced in the healthcare sector in recent months as firms seek to gain scale or specialise in certain disease areas.

The Commission said the takeover would create overlaps between the activities of the two drugmakers in the markets for parasiticides and antimicrobials.

But it concluded that more competitors could enter the market in the coming years and keep prices in check.

Novartis separately agreed in April to buy GlaxoSmithKline's oncology products for $14.5 billion and sell its vaccine business to the British drugmaker for $7.1 billion.

Reuters