$21.4 billion! Danaher buys GE Life Sciences' biopharma busi

Danaher Corporation announced that it has entered into a definitive agreement with General Electric to acquire GE Life Sciences' GE Biopharma business with a cash purchase price of approximately $21.4 billion. Given the expected tax benefits of the transaction structure, the net purchase price is approximately $20 billion. This is approximately 17 times the expected earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) of GE Biopharma.
 
GE Biopharma is a leading supplier of instruments, consumables and software dedicated to supporting biopharmaceutical research, discovery, process development and manufacturing workflows. The business includes process chromatography hardware and consumables, cell culture media, disposable technology, development instruments, consumables, and services.GE Biopharma is expected to generate approximately $3.2 billion in annual revenue in 2019, of which approximately 75% is considered to be recurring.
 
The business will become an independent operating company of Danaher's Life Sciences division, working with Pall, Beckman Coulter Life Sciences, SCIEX, Leica Microsystems, Molecular Devices, Phenomenex and IDT to form Danaher's life sciences platform.
 
Thomas P. Joyce, Jr., President and CEO of Danaher, said: “GE Biopharma is known for providing first-class bioprocessing technologies and solutions. The acquisition will bring a talented and passionate team, and a highly innovative suite of leading products that complement our life science portfolio and provides an excellent complement to Danaher's current biologic workflow solutions."
 
Joyce continues: “I hope GE Biopharma will advance our growth and innovation strategy in an important and attractive life sciences market.We will leverage the power of the Danaher Business System to further provide GE Biopharma's customers with end-to-end bioprocessing solutions that enable breakthrough development and production capabilities. We look forward to joining this Danaher Group with this talented team. ”
 
Danaher expects to raise $3 billion in trading cash through equity issuance (which may include the issuance of mandatory convertible preferred stock), with the rest coming from the Group's available funds and debt issuance.
 
The transaction is expected to be completed in the fourth quarter of 2019 and is subject to customary conditions, including receipt of applicable regulatory approvals.