Roche’s new chairman has signalled his intention to follow his predecessor’s tight-fisted approach toward acquisitions even now that the drugmaker has paid down much of the debt from its last big deal.

Roche has been willing in the past to abandon planned purchases over price, and the company will review opportunities very carefully, said Christoph Franz, who was elected chairman yesterday at the drugmaker's annual meeting in Basel, Switzerland.

“Often the best business decisions are the ones you don’t make,” he said.

His comments hew to the strategy his predecessor Franz Humer and chief executive Severin Schwan have followed.

Roche shelved a $6.7 billion hostile bid for gene-sequencing company Illumina in 2012 after shareholders held out for more money. – (Bloomberg)