CVC, Bain Among Bidders in $3 Billion Curium Pharma Sale
CVC, Bain Among Bidders in $3 Billion Curium Pharma Sale
(Bloomberg) -- CVC Capital Partners and Bain Capital are among buyout firms that submitted initial bids for Curium Pharma, a French maker of medical imaging supplies, people familiar with the matter said.
Clayton Dubilier & Rice, Nordic Capital and PAI Partners also made first-round offers for the business, which is owned by CapVest Ltd., according to the people. Curium could fetch at least $3 billion, the people said, asking not to be identified because the information is private.
Management presentations are taking place this week, and the company expects to receive the next round of bids in February, the people said.
Curium provides materials used in nuclear medicine to help diagnose cancer as well as heart, brain and bone diseases. The company was created by merging IBA Molecular with a Mallinckrodt Plc business in 2017.
No final decisions have been made, and there’s no certainty that the suitors will proceed with binding offers, the people said. Representatives for CapVest, CVC, Bain, Nordic Capital and PAI declined to comment, while CD&R didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
Private equity firms have been involved in $83.7 billion of health-care deals over the past year, data compiled by Bloomberg show. They’ve been willing to pay high earnings multiples as they seek to deploy their ample amounts of uninvested capital. KKR & Co. agreed to sell scientific measurement and testing company LGC Group to a consortium led by Cinven and Astorg in December.
CapVest’s proposed sale of Curium could be one of the biggest exits for the mid-market private equity firm. The business generates about 600 million euros ($669 million) in revenue annually, Bloomberg News reported in December. It makes about 200 million euros in earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization, a person with knowledge of the matter said at the time.
--With assistance from Sarah Syed and Jan-Henrik Förster.
To contact the reporters on this story: Dinesh Nair in London at dnair5@bloomberg.net;Myriam Balezou in London at mbalezou@bloomberg.net;Manuel Baigorri in Hong Kong at mbaigorri@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Ben Scent at bscent@bloomberg.net, Thomas Pfeiffer
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