The following communication was sent or made available to shareholders of Jazz Pharmaceuticals plc commencing on July 15, 2022
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JAZZ PHARMACEUTICALS PUBLIC LIMITED COMPANY
Annual General Meeting of Shareholders
July 28, 2022
Supplemental Information Regarding Proposals 4 and 5
Dear Shareholders:
We would like to underscore the importance of your votes on the proposals being presented at our 2022 Annual General Meeting of Shareholders (“AGM”). The proposals are described in detail in our proxy statement and additional soliciting materials, which have been made available to you and filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (the “SEC”).
We would like to draw your attention specifically to Proposal 4—Board Authority to Issue Shares for Cash Without First Offering Shares to Existing Shareholders (referred to in this letter as the “pre-emption proposal”) and Proposal 5—Adjournment Proposal (referred to in this letter as the “adjournment proposal”). We believe that the approval of the pre-emption proposal is important to the way we intend to advance our business and reflects shareholder feedback. We therefore request your support for our pre-emption and adjournment proposals.
As certain of our shareholders know, Glass Lewis & Co. has recommended that its clients vote “FOR” our pre-emption and adjournment proposals and Institutional Shareholder Services (“ISS”) has recommended that its clients vote against our pre-emption proposal and accordingly, our adjournment proposal. While we recognize that our shareholders make their voting decisions independently, and often apply their own internal guidelines, we also understand that the proxy advisory firms’ reports are utilized as research tools by many of our shareholders. In this regard, we believe it is important to provide our perspective on ISS’ voting recommendations, in particular given that ISS qualified its recommendation against these proposals as being “with caution”, in light of certain mitigating factors.
ISS stated in its report for our AGM that as it does not currently have a U.S. policy for pre-emption proposals and as we are incorporated in Ireland, our pre-emption proposal was analyzed under ISS’ UK & Ireland Voting Policy (the “Irish Policy”) notwithstanding the fact that our ordinary shares are listed exclusively on the Nasdaq Global Select Market and therefore the U.S. capital markets are the sole capital markets for our ordinary shares.
While we disagree with the application of the Irish Policy to our pre-emption proposal, we note that ISS highlighted in its report that there are additional considerations for shareholders stemming from the fact that our ordinary shares are listed exclusively on the Nasdaq Global Select Market. We specifically wish to draw your attention to the following statement contained in the ISS’ report: “However, shareholders may wish to take into account that the company is listed solely in the United States, where pre-emption rights are all-but non-existent, and that the limits under the company’s proposal correspond to the magnitude of share issuances that do not generally require shareholder approval under Nasdaq listing rules. Some shareholders may feel that this proposal provides adequate safeguards against excessive dilution.”
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Jazz Pharmaceuticals plc. registered in Ireland (company number 399192) Registered Office: Fifth Floor, Waterloo Exchange, Waterloo Road, Dublin 4, Ireland Directors: Bruce C. Cozadd – Chairman (USA), Jennifer Cook (USA), Patrick G. Enright (USA), Peter Gray, Heather Ann McSharry, Seamus Mulligan, Kenneth W. O’Keefe (USA), Anne O’Riordan, Norbert G. Riedel (DE), Catherine A. Sohn (USA), Mark Smith (USA), Rick E Winningham (USA) | | Fifth Floor, Waterloo Exchange, Waterloo Road, Dublin 4, Ireland T: +353.1.634.7800 F: +353.1.634.7850 |