Sector News

French CDMO Delpharm, which already has a dozen sites across Europe, is planning a big expansion with a deal to pick up five more, including one in North America, along with 1,300 employees in a deal worth more than $250 million.

Delpharm said in an emailed release today that it is in exclusive negotiations with Greece-based Famar to buy French sites in Orléans (Loiret), Aigle (Orne) and St-Rémy-sur-Avre (Eure-et-Loire), along with Famar’s site in Bladel in the Netherlands and its Pointe-Claire site in Quebec, Canada.

The deal, which covers nearly half of the financially-struggling Famar’s network of 11 sites, represents an investment of €250 million ($274 million), Delpharm said. The CDMO’s expect to close the deal in November.

“The Board of Directors has agreed that the offer proposed by Delpharm is in the best interest of the five sites and their employees,” Delpharm President Patrick Puy, said in a statement. “The completion of this transaction will allow these sites to enter into a new phase of sustainable and promising development.”

Athens-based Famar had been aggressively building its network several years ago. In 2016 it acquired an FDA-approved site in Leganes, Spain, from Roche. The following year, Delpharm also bought a site from Roche, this one in Segrate, Italy.

But Famar’s parent, the Marinopoulos Group, ran into financial problems several years ago. At the end of last year, Reuters reported that Famar completed a €174 million debt restructuring and got an infusion of cash from private equity-backed Pillarstone.

By Eric Palmer

Source: Fierce Pharma