American Capital to expand Cambridge Major Labs' API biz

Cambridge Major Labs’ (CML) new private-equity investor plans to expand the CMO’s chemistry and API business and assess cross selling synergies with other firms in its portfolio.

The Germantown, Wisconsin-based contract manufacturing organisation (CMO) was acquired from Arlington Capital Partners in a management buyout that saw US investment fund American Capital Ltd stump up $212m (€158m) for a majority stake.

Kyle Bradford, a Managing Director in American Capital’s buyout group, told Outsourcing-pharma.com that CML’s capabilities in chemistry, coupled with its active pharmaceutical ingredient (API) manufacturing capacity had attracted the private equity firm.

He added that: “American Capital plans to grow the business and pursue acquisitions and no headcount reductions or facility divestitures are planned” citing CML’s recently expanded active pharmaceutical ingredient (API) capacity in Europe and the US as key growth drivers.

This fits with comments made by CML CEO Brian Scanlan who said: “American Capital's financial and operational resources will allow us to expand our market presence in the U.S. and internationally” when the takeover was announced last month.

Bradford also said that American Capital will look for sales and marketing synergies between CML and Scientific Protein Labs (SPL) in which the investment group also has a stake, although he stressed that there are no plans to merge the two organisations.

American Capital has held an 87 per cent stake in Waunakee, Wisconsin-based SPL - which is a producer of both heparin and pancreatin APIs - since 2006 when it took control of the firm from Arsenal Capital Partners, management and other several other investors.