A little over a month after Pfizer pulled its $160 billion merger with Irish peer Allergan in the face of US regulatory pushback, the US pharma company has turned to two of the independent advisers on that failed transaction to steer its latest deal.

Pfizer announced on May 16 that it had agreed the $5.2 billion acquisition of Anacor Pharmaceuticals, a Palo Alto-based biopharma company with a treatment for eczema that is being reviewed by US Food and Drug Administration officials.