MAR / APR 2021
Lonza to sell Specialty Ingredients business
The new owners will invest at the Visp site
Following a long period of speculation , Lonza has agreed to sell its Lonza Specialty Ingredients ( LSI ) business to private equity firms Bain Capital and Cinven for CHF 4.2 billion in order to focus entirely on healthcare . The deal is expected to close in 2H , subject to customary closing conditions . Basel-headquartered LSI , most of which was formerly Arch Chemicals , turns over about CHF 820 million / year . It has 17 manufacturing sites , 11 R & D centres and some 2,800 employees , offering microbial control for disinfectants , preservatives , sanitisers and personal care products , custom development and manufacturing of speciality chemicals and composites for the electronics , aerospace , food and agrochemical industries . The acquiring consortium said that LSI provides a range of differentiated speciality chemical products , is in a market with strong structural growth and a diversified set of attractive end-markets . Its strategy is to :
• Enhance the R & D capabilities of LSI to continue to develop new chemistries to control microbes
• Build deeper customer relationships through customised application development
• Consolidate the fragmented microbial control market through buy-andbuild opportunities ; and
• Invest further in the facility at Visp “ Both Bain Capital and Cinven have strong experience in the industrials sector and an established track record of successful investments in portfolio companies ,” Lonza commented . The former currently owns Diversey and Italmatch , and previously Brenntag and Trinseo ; Cinven owns distributor Barentz and construction chemicals firm Chryso . It previously owned CeramTec and Kloeckner Pentaplast .
IN BRIEF
Catalyst plant in China
Sinocompound Catalysts , which supplies homogeneous catalysts and ligands for pharmaceutical and fine chemical applications , is to build a 65,000 m 2 , $ 20 million , 50 tonnes / year plant with automation workflows at Tongling in China ’ s Anhui province . Due open in September , the plant will also be able to recycle 2 tonnes / year of high-purity chemical and metals , notably palladium or rhodium , from catalysts .
Arcinova ’ s new owner
Quotient Sciences , a ‘ drug development and manufacturing accelerator ’ that is itself owned by private equity firm Permira has acquired Arcinova , a CDMO that operates a former Sanofi and Covance site at Alnwick , UK . Terms were not disclosed . Quotient said that adding Arcinova will expand its service portfolio and “ enable the integration of drug substance , drug product and clinical testing capabilities all under one organisation ”.
Almac expands
Almac Sciences has completed a £ 5 million investment in a new , two-storey technology centre for biocatalysis , flow chemistry technologies and peptide R & D at its main site in Craigavon , Northern Ireland . This consists of 32 fume hoods and an engineering workshop for tooling . It can house up to 100 employees and 20 more are being recruited . A “ significant number of projects ” have already begun there , the firm said .
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