Value Creation through Company Building 

CMC Biologics, now rebranded as AGC Biologics, is a leading international Contract Development and Manufacturing Organization (“CDMO”) within biopharmaceutical Active Pharmaceutical Ingredient (“API”) and Cell and Gene Therapy (“CGT”).

During EEP’s ownership the Company established its first laboratories and built its first integrated manufacturing facility in Copenhagen,Denmark and thereafter acquired two manufacturing facilities in the US.

The Company’s services include process development, scale-up, and production of API protein material for pre-clinical, phase I, II, III and in-market commercial quantities. The Company is also a leader in Cell and Gene Therapy agents manufacture with facilities in Europe and the US.

Today, AGC Biologics has operations in Europe, the US and Japan, and employ more than 2000 people. The Company is approved for commercial production by FDA, EMEA, Health Canada and the Japanese Health Authorities. Over the years the Company has developed a large diversified client base of biopharmaceutical companies and CGT companies including several of the world’s largest pharma companies.

From the date EEP invested in 2002 and until the sale to AGC Japan in 2017, the Company realised an average annual revenue growth rate in excess of 50% and the number of staff grew from 6 to in excess of 500.

As an active lead investor, EEP assisted management and the Company in realising this expansion by ensuring adequate equity and debt funding, as well as being a partner in crafting successful strategies and building a winning organisation. Further, EEP had a lead role in planning and negotiating the sale of theCompany to the best strategic buyer for the business.

Verdot is an international French high-quality designer and manufacturer of purification processing equipment, used in manufacture of biologics API, Viral Vectors for cell and gene therapy, mRNA, Lipid nanoparticles, Exosomes and Vaccines.

Verdot commercialises its products and services to world leading pharmaceutical and biotech companies and CDMOs.

The Company has sales in Europe, USA and Asia. EEP was invited to co-invest by the Company’s lead PE investors Lauxera and Qualium Invest. Also, EEP was offered an observation position on the Company’s board and is assisting Verdot with strategy input and industry network.

In 2020 Azanta was acquired by Norgine. Azanta was a specialty pharma company focused on women’s health and addiction medicine.

The Company also had a program within oncology. Azanta had its own sales organization supported by in-house medical and regulatory departments and a logistics infrastructure. The Company’s sales force operated in the Nordic countries and in France and worked through partners in other territories. The Company targeted being a market leader within certain specialty pharma product categories, particularlyi n women’s health, employing innovative repositioning and drug formulation strategies.

Following EEP’s investment in 2015, Azanta succeeded a financial turnaround, strengthened its organization and expanded its commercial infrastructure. Also, the Company achieved regulatory approval of Angusta®; a best in class labor inductionmedicine product.

Bactolife develops novel biological solutions to reduce the risk of gastrointestinal infections in humans and animals. Antimicrobial resistance development is a major and increasing threat to human health worldwide. It is expected that deaths attributed to infectious diseases will surpass the number of cancer-related deaths by 2050.

David Kauffmann and EEP first made a seed investment in Bactolife in 2017. David served as the Company’s Chairman through to the successful Euro 7m fundraising of the Company in April 2021 which was led by Novo Seeds, the early stage investment and company creation team of Novo Holdings.

Founded in 2017, Bactolife has developed a technology based on nanobodies for management of bacterial virulence without the use of antibiotics. Its proprietary platform consists of technology for selecting and producing virulence inactivating proteins (VIP TM ) without targeting growth or killing the bacteria directly. VIPs are stable and highly cost-effective and can be produced in large-scale using state-of-the-art systems for biomanufacturing.

Bactolife has developed a pipeline of projects within animal and human health based on its VIP technology where specially designed proteins protect the microbiome by inactivation of pathogenic virulence factors leaving the healthy microbiome intact.

Aster-Cephac, now re-branded as SGS Life Sciences, is a leading European multi-service Life Sciences Contract Research Organization (“CRO”) dedicated to early Clinical Development and Bio-analysis services.

The Company offers Clinical Pharmacology (Phase I & II studies), Bio-analysis, Bio-statistic and Medical writing services to the world’s pharmaceutical industries and personal care companies.

During the time of investment (1996 – 2006) Aster-Cephac more than quadrupled its annual revenue and increased it profitability margins to be in line with other world-leading international CROs. As Chairman of the Board, David Kauffmann, was part of setting the Company’s strategic direction and establishing the priorities for building the Company’s organizational and business infrastructure to sustain and accelerate the Company’s growth.

The global CRO industry had been consolidating over several years and the sale of Aster-Cephac to the SGS Life Sciences was planned and realized considering this market dynamic.

Bio-Research Laboratories (“Bio-Research”), now rebranded as Charles River Laboratories, is a world leading pre-clinical research organization. The Company, is one of the corner-stone operational units in the Charles River Group, offering pre-clinical drug development services to the world’s pharmaceutical and biotechnology industries.

The Company was originally formed as part of the Canadian Crown corporation biosciences group. When taken private Bio-Research was looking for growth capital which could assist the Company with its international growth aspirations.

During the investment period (1992 – 1996) Bio-Research more than doubled its revenue and turned from being loss-making to becoming very profitable and cash generative. The Company placed a renewed emphasis on marketing of new, higher margin service lines and broadening its client base to become more international.

Throughout the duration of the investment, discussions were held with industry players and in doing so many partners and potential purchaser of the Company were identified. In 1996, Bio-Research was sold to ClinTrials Research Inc, which later was acquired by Inveresk Research Group, now part of the Charles River Laboratories group.

PharmaKinetics Laboratories Inc. (“PharmaKinetics”), sold to Bioanalytical Systems Inc. (“BASi”), was a Baltimore, US based, Contract Research organization (“CRO”) providing pharmacology and bioanalysis services to the generic pharmaceutical industry.

During the investment period the Company’s management and quality systems were upgraded in order to accommodate the standards required by the US Food and Drug Administration (“FDA”) and the pharmaceutical client base. In 2002 the Company was sold to BASi.