Spain’s healthcare products maker Grifols acquires US biotech company Talecris for $3.4B

Spain’s Grifols buys US biotech company Talecris

MADRID — Spanish healthcare company Grifols SA said Monday it had acquired Talecris Biotherapeutics, based in North Carolina, for euro2.8 billion ($3.4 billion).

In a statement on both companies’ websites, Grifols, a leading producer of blood plasma products and therapies, said the deal would create “a global leader of lifesaving and life-enhancing plasma protein therapeutics.”

The company said the acquisition of Talecris is expected to generate approximately euro190 million ($230 million) in operating synergies.

The statement said the resulting transaction value of the deal, including net debt, would be approximately euro3.3 billion (US$4 billion).

The combined company will have pro-forma annual revenues of approximately euro2.34 billion ($2.8 billion), the statement said.

The Spanish company’s shares were down 6.5 percent at euro8.6 ($10.28) in afternoon trading in Madrid that saw most companies’ shares fall.

The statement said the leading shareholders of Grifols had agreed to vote in favor of the transaction and an affiliate of Cerberus Capital Management, L.P., which owns approximately 49 percent of the outstanding Talecris common stock, had entered a similar agreement.

The transaction is expected to close in the second half of 2010.

Grifols, with centers in more than 90 countries, researches, develops, manufactures and markets plasma derivatives, IV therapy, enteral nutrition, diagnostic systems and medical materials.

Talecris is a worldwide biotherapeutic and biotechnology company that discovers, develops and produces critical care treatments for people with life-threatening disorders, the statement added.

The company operates more than 50 plasma collection centers and two manufacturing plants in the United States.