Ackman-led team takes 10% stake in Zoetis The activist investor Bill Ackman is leading a $2.2bn raid on Zoetis, the animal vaccines and medications business spun off from Pfizer less than two years ago, saying it should again be wrapped into a larger pharmaceuticals company. Mr Ackman's Pershing Square has taken an 8.5 per cent stake in Zoetis. Another activist hedge fund, Sachem Head Capital Management, run by former Ackman employee Scott Ferguson, has acquired a further 1.6 per cent. The pair are pushing for Zoetis to be put up for sale, so that a bigger company's management can strip out costs, according to a person familiar with their thinking. Under Mr Ackman's plan, one potential bidder could be Valeant Pharmaceuticals, an acquisitive drugmaker that is trying to take over Allergan in concert with Mr Ackman. His intervention comes amid intense merger and acquisition activity in the pharmaceuticals sector, and after Zoetis had already become the subject of takeover speculation. The German pharmaceuticals group Bayer has expressed interest in acquiring additional life sciences businesses and has been tipped as a potential bidder. Management was asked about takeover defences on its most recent conference call with analysts. Zoetis chief financial officer Paul Herendeen said: "We are a public company. We are for sale every day. And to the extent that someone were to come in and be interested they could do a better job with our collection of assets, there's certainly the opportunity for them to express that. Pfizer spun off the company in an initial public offering priced at $26 per share in January 2013, as part of its own plan to concentrate on human pharmaceuticals. Zoetis sells more than 300 lines of products to livestock producers and veterinarians across 70 countries. In a statement, the company acknowledged that it "received a call from Bill Ackman of Pershing Square indicating that the firm has made an investment in Zoetis." Shares of the New Jersey-based company advanced nearly 9 per cent to close at $43.72, valuing the company at nearly $22bn. Mr Ackman's stakebuilding was first reported by the Wall Street Journal. Pershing Square and Sachem Head's 10.1 per cent stake was worth $2.2bn after Tuesday's share price rise. The stake has been accumulated through a mixture of share purchase and derivatives positions at an initial cost of more than $1.5bn. Zoetis executives are preparing for an annual investor day next week to set out the company's strategy, amid demands from analysts for more details on forthcoming veterinary drugs and for longer-range financial forecasts. Additional reporting by Mamta Badkar