Sigma Healthcare: Main Hurdle for Chemist Warehouse Acquisition Overcome

The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission has approved Sigma Healthcare’s proposed acquisition of Chemist Warehouse, or CW, largely based on Sigma’s proposed remedies. Despite the ACCC delaying its decision twice, opposition from pharmacists and major bodies including the Pharmacy Guild and Ebos, and admitting the acquisition is a major structural change for the pharmacy market, it concluded the proposed remedies would assuage the initial competition concerns raised in June 2024.