Pfizer has begun taking offers on Hospira’s pumps and devices business, after considering offloading it for some time. A sale would free Pfizer of an acquisition that falls outside the scope of its traditional drug business.
Med tech companies Smiths Group and Fresenius put in bids for the unit, which Pfizer picked up last year through its $15 billion deal for Hospira. Private equity firm Pamplona Capital made a second-round bid for the business, Bloomberg reports, although final bids for the unit aren’t due until the end of May.
Pfizer has said that it could reap about $2 billion from a sale of Hospira’s devices business. Representatives from Pfizer, Germany’s Fresenius and London-based Smiths Group declined to comment to the news outlet.
Pfizer snatched up Hospira in order to get its hands on the company’s biosimilars and generic injectables. Hospira’s pumps and devices unit doesn’t fit in with the rest of Pfizer’s established products business, and selling the business would create a more pure-play drugs unit that’s ripe for a sale, IPO or spinoff.
More changes could also be on the horizon for Pfizer after its $160 billion deal with Allergan ($AGN) fell through last month. The company is going to decide by the end of this year whether it should break into two separate businesses, its original timeline for the breakup, Pfizer CEO Ian Read said at the time.
And meanwhile, the drug giant will continue to scout out deals and explore “other shareholder friendly capital allocation opportunities,” he said in a statement.
By Emily Wasserman
Source: Fierce Pharma
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