New York, NY, April 12, 2007 – Avista Capital Partners, a leading private equity firm, announced today it has completed its acquisition of BioReliance Corporation, a business unit of Invitrogen Corporation (NASDAQ: IVGN) for approximately $210 million. BioReliance is a leading contract service organization providing biological safety testing, toxicology, viral manufacturing, and laboratory animal diagnostic services to the pharmaceutical and biopharmaceutical industries globally.
Tim Derrington, who served as General Manager of BioReliance under Invitrogen, has been appointed CEO. Charles Harwood has been appointed Executive Chairman of the BioReliance Board of Directors. Mr. Harwood was previously President and CEO of Focus Diagnostics, where he worked closely with the Avista Capital Partners team.
Mr. Derrington stated, “Avista is the ideal partner to help us enhance our ability to develop and deliver outstanding biologics safety testing and other R&D testing services to our customers. We look forward to benefiting from the Avista team’s extensive experience with and understanding of the healthcare industry, and strengthening our company’s leading position in the niche markets in which we operate.”
“We are eager to partner again with Charles Harwood and look forward to working with Tim Derrington and the entire BioReliance team,” said David Burgstahler, a partner at Avista Capital Partners. “BioReliance has built an impressive record as a premier service provider and is a recognized leader in each of its service areas, and we are very excited about the company’s future growth prospects.”
“BioReliance has a solid reputation for pioneering scientific advancements in the contract services organization industry, strong regulatory expertise, and innovative testing solutions,” added Larry Pickering, a Healthcare Industry Partner at Avista Capital Partners and BioReliance Board member. “Healthcare is one of our core capabilities at Avista, and we believe that by working closely with the talented leadership team at BioReliance, we will better position the company to take full advantage of favorable industry trends within the biopharmaceutical sector.”
Founded in 1947 as Microbiological Associates, Rockville, Maryland based BioReliance is a specialist provider of contract biologics safety testing, GMP manufacturing, and pre-clinical testing services, and focuses on the rapidly growing biologics sector of the pharmaceutical industry. The company provides cost-effective services to over 600 clients annually, including most of the largest pharmaceutical and biopharmaceutical companies in the world. BioReliance’s services and broad experience provide all of its clients with a cost effective alternative to the fixed costs associated with internal development and manufacturing.
In 2006, Avista closed on healthcare investments in Nycomed (www.nycomed.com) and MedServe (www.medserveinc.com). While at DLJ Merchant Banking Partners, the Avista partners led numerous healthcare transactions including Accellant, Charles River Laboratories, Focus Diagnostics, KCI, Prometheus Labs, and Warner Chilcott.
Weil, Gotshal & Manges served as legal counsel for Avista Capital Partners, and financing was arranged by UBS Securities and The Royal Bank of Scotland.
About Avista Capital Partners
Avista Capital Partners is a leading private equity firm with offices in New York, NY and Houston, TX. Founded in 2005, Avista’s strategy is to make controlling or influential minority investments primarily in growth-oriented media, healthcare and energy companies. Through its team of seasoned investment professionals and industry experts, Avista seeks to partner with exceptional management teams to invest in and add value to well-positioned businesses.
About BioReliance
BioReliance Corporation is a leading contract services organization, offering more than 1,000 tests or services related to biologics safety testing, in vitro and in vivo toxicology, viral manufacturing and lab animal health diagnostics for the biopharmaceutical and pharmaceutical industries. BioReliance has its primary facilities in Rockville, Maryland, Glasgow, Scotland and Stirling, Scotland. Headquartered in Rockville, Maryland, BioReliance employs over 700 people globally. For more information, visit www.bioreliance.com.
About Invitrogen Corporation
Invitrogen Corporation (Nasdaq:IVGN) provides products and services that support academic and government research institutions and pharmaceutical and biotech companies worldwide in their efforts to improve the human condition. The company provides essential life science technologies for disease research, drug discovery, and commercial bioproduction. Invitrogen’s own research and development efforts are focused on breakthrough innovation in all major areas of biological discovery including functional genomics, proteomics, bioinformatics and cell biology — placing Invitrogen’s products in nearly every major laboratory in the world. Founded in 1987, Invitrogen is headquartered in Carlsbad, California, and conducts business in more than 70 countries around the world. The company is celebrating 20 years of accelerating scientific discovery. Invitrogen globally employs approximately 4,300 scientists and other professionals and had revenues of more than $1.26 billion in 2006. For more information, visit www.invitrogen.com.
Forward-Looking Statements
Certain statements made in this release are “forward-looking” statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Forward-looking statements include, without limitation, any statement that may predict, forecast, indicate, or imply future results, performance, or achievements, and may contain the words “expect”, “believe”, “anticipate”, “confident”, “estimate”, “project”, “will be”, “will continue”, or similar words or phrases. Comments such as those with respect to the timing for Avista Capital Partners to consummate the proposed acquisition of BioReliance Corporation constitute forward-looking statements. As and when made, management believes that these forward-looking statements are reasonable. BioReliance undertakes no obligation to revise or publicly release the results of any revision to these forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements involve risk and uncertainties, which may cause actual results to differ materially from the forward-looking statements. Given these risks and uncertainties, investors should not place undue reliance on forward-looking statements as a prediction of actual results.
Contact for Avista Capital Partners:
Diana Postemsky, Kekst and Company, 212-521-4805