Healthcare-focused GP ArchiMed has acquired French biotechnology laboratory Clean Cells from Sodero Gestion.

Over the past three years, Clean Cells has experienced substantial growth in its original core business segments and made a successful launch as CDMO in the phage therapy sector. ArchiMed has joined the capital of Clean Cells to help drive the company’s growth strategy in its core business areas and to strengthen its investment capacity. ArchiMed is buying out family members and other long-standing shareholders, including T.O.D. Finances and Sodero Gestion.ArchiMed is the first independent, Pan-European private equity group focused on healthcare SMEs. The group is continuing to invest in the biopharmaceutical production and development field, following its investments in Deallus Consulting, Polyplus-transfection and Provepharm Life Solutions. ArchiMed and two of the Founders of Clean Cells are joining forces to roll out an ambitious strategy to strengthen the company’s market position in biosafety testing and cell and virus seed banking at an international level, and to develop the phage therapy CDMO activity. A new pharmaceutical production site will be operational in 2020 to address the growing number of projects.

To complete this transaction, Clean Cells was advised by financial advisory firm Advolis and law firm Oratio. For its due diligence, ArchiMed was assisted by Mazars (Financial, Tax, Social), Lamartine (Legal), Larka (Commercial, Quality & Regulatory), Becker (Intellectual Property), and SOGEDEV (CIR).

 

Adviser Interview - Pierre-Anthony Brioir, Director at Larka

What was Larka’s role in the transaction?

Larka performed the strategic due diligence and advised ArchiMed on all relevant strategic, commercial and technological aspects of the transaction. In addition, Larka performed the quality and regulatory due diligences.

The Pharma & BioTech industry is so complex. Why do investment firms choose Larka to support them?

I think the answer is in the question. They choose Larka because the BioPharma industry is – increasingly – complex. The supply chain is very fragmented, the value chain is highly complex. Quality systems and Regulatory environment are very demanding. R&D and Manufacturing processes are more and more specialised. In the meantime, the industry is changing dramatically, from established, large-volume products to innovative, personalised therapies, along with a challenging socioeconomic environment. So, in the end, it makes the whole decision-making process complex, while Larka makes it simple, clear,  and easily understandable.

How do you make it simple?

To answer this question, we should look at Larka’s origins.Larka was founded in 1993 by an industrial pharmacist and is exclusively dedicated to Pharma & BioTech industry since then. At that time, our services was focused on ‘Industry’ consulting, addressing all scientific, technical and industrial challenges related to Bio/Pharmaceutical products and covering the whole value chain – which involves a wide variety of Contract Services Providers such as CROs, CDMOs or CMOs.In 2003, Larka launched its Strategy division to complete and expand its offerings. Combining corporate strategy and M&A with a deep knowledge of all scientific and technical aspects of the industry quickly made us very relevant and successful, especially when compared to non-specialised consulting firms.Therefore, I believe that it’s our industry DNA combined with high value-creation strategic advisory that allow Larka to make our clients’ decision-making processes simple and digestible.

Could we say that Larka is a recent player in the Private Equity landscape?

We are. Larka was approached by PE firms for the first time in 2010, but at that time, we only had an opportunistic approach of M&A assignments for financial players. It was only in 2015 – after being successful in offering insightful and didactic due diligences, sell/buy-side – that we decided to be ‘commercially’ proactive towards PE firms. This division has been skyrocketing since then.

So, what is next for Larka?

We recently introduced M&A advisory services, which, when combined with our knowledge of the BioPharma industry and its most relevant buyers, positions us as the right partner to support sellers in their exit or funding strategy.