Recipharm Acquires Flamel Facility As Part Of $26M Deal
Swedish CDMO Recipharm and French-based Flamel Technologies announced a long-term collaboration in which Recipharm will purchase Flamel’s Pessac facility and Flamel stock, and take over several new development and manufacturing contracts. The current financial deal is worth $26 million with the option of additional contracts.
The Pessac facility is located in Bordeaux, France and is regulatory compliant with both the FDA and ANSM. Currently, the facility manufactures Flamel’s Medusa and Micropump technologies. It houses warehouses, quality control labs, and three spray-coating machines.
The deal amounts to a five-year service agreement in which Recipharm will pay $13.2 million in cash and will invest $13.1 million in Flamel stock. Under the terms of the agreement, Flamel can continue to use Pessac’s development and manufacturing capabilities and gains access to Recipharm’s other facilities for drugs in their development pipeline.
Michael Anderson, CEO of Flamel, said the deal was a strategic move to shift Flamel’s focus towards development. He commented, “Flamel’s primary objective is the development of products using the company’s proprietary drug delivery platforms. The sale of the Pessac facility frees Flamel from the time-consuming task of running a contract development manufacturing facility.”
Along with the Pessac facility, Recipharm gains the royalty contract for Coreg CR with GlaxoSmithKline and the option to negotiate for contracts to manufacture products Flamel intends to license in the European market.
This deal is only the latest in a series of Recipharm acquisitions.
In October, Recipharm purchased Corvette Pharmaceuticals from an Italian private equity firm in a deal worth $124 million, expanding Recipharm’s market foothold in Italy and several other European pharma markets.
In November, Recipharm announced a $140 million deal to acquire Lusomedicamenta, a Portuguese CDMO — a move that would consolidate the two companies into one of the largest contract development and manufacturing organizations in Europe.
Thomas Eldered, CEO of Recipharm, commented that Recipharm was particularly interested in Lusomedicamenta’s foothold in Portugal and presence in the African market, saying there was very little customer overlap between the two companies.