Sartorius lays out $500m to buy recombinant albumin firm Albumedix

Sartorius Stedim Biotech will add a portfolio of recombinant albumin-based products used in drug manufacture and a 72,000 square-foot production facility through the acquisition of Albumedix.

During its second quarter financial call last month, bioprocess vendor Sartorius spoke about its desire to acquire complementary technologies and innovation through a war chest of around €10 billion ($10.2 billion) firepower at its disposal.

Less than three weeks on, and the firm has pulled the trigger, agreeing to buy Albumedix for approximately £415 million ($502 million). The Nottingham, UK-based company produces recombinant albumin for use in various applications by biomanufacturers, including as an animal-free additive to cell culture media and for the stabilization of vaccines and viral therapies.

“Recombinant albumin is a critical raw material in cell culture media and complements other acquisitions we have made, such as Biological Industries and CellGenix, to strengthen our position in this market segment,” a spokesperson from the firm told us. “This acquisition will help us to further strengthen our position in the cell culture media space.”

Image: c/o commons.wikimedia: Jawahar Swaminathan and MSD staff at the European Bioinformatics Institute – http://www.ebi.ac.uk

René Fáber, member of the Executive Board for the Bioprocess Solutions Division of Sartorius, added in a statement: “Albumedix will be an important addition to Sartorius’ advanced therapy solutions, particularly regarding our cell culture media business, as it will enable us to strengthen our position as a relevant supplier of innovative chemically defined media and critical ancillary materials.

“This market offers high growth potential due to the increasing regulatory requirements as well as rising demand for the use of recombinant human albumin in near-patient applications. Albumedix will also add important formulation excipients to our vaccine production solutions, allowing us to expand our existing customer relationships and forge new ones.”

Albumedix was founded in 1984 and is expected to pull in revenues of around £33 million for the year. The business, along with its recently expanded 72,000 square-foot site in Nottingham, will be established as a center of excellence for innovation and GMP-compliant production of critical raw materials within Sartorius’s Bioprocess Solutions Division once the deal closes (expected by the end of the third quarter 2022).