Lloyds pharmacies and United Drug sold to billionaire Merckle family from Germany
US pharmaceuticals group McKesson Corp has agreed to sell its Irish business, which includes the 90-outlet chain of Lloyds pharmacies and the United Drug wholesale group. McKesson Ireland also includes TCP Homecare, which provides nurses, and Media Healthcare, which sells drugs to nursing homes.
McKesson announced its exit from the Irish market as part of
a deal to sell its operations in eight European countries to the Phoenix pharma
group controlled by the billionaire Merckle family from Germany. As well as the
operations in Ireland, Phoenix has also bought McKesson’s units in France,
Italy, Portugal, Belgium and Slovenia.
The deal also includes McKesson’s German headquarters in
Stuttgart; German wound-care business RecuCare; a back office operation in
Lithuania; and its 45 per cent stake in Brocacef, a pharmacy supplies business
in the Netherlands.
The Irish business has a turnover estimated at about €2
billion and employs about 1,800 staff here, including more than 900 in Lloyds,
which is the second largest pharmacy chain in the market after Boots.
United Drug employs about 650 staff, while TCP has about 165
staff, including 90 nurses.
McKesson said its businesses in the UK, where it also owns
Lloyds, Norway, Austria and Denmark are not included in the deal, which is
scheduled to close next year. However, it suggested they remain up for sale as
part of a “strategic review” over their future. It is also retaining a minority
stake in a German joint venture with Walgreens Boots Alliance.
McKesson’s head office in the US declined on Thursday to
comment further on the deal to sell the Irish business. The company did not
disclose the value of the deal.
Reverses
The move largely reverses McKesson’s $8.3 billion (€7bn)
purchase of Celesio in 2014. Bloomberg reported in June that McKesson was in
talks to sell its European operations to Phoenix and was also in discussions to
offload the UK arm to a private equity firm. Bloomberg Intelligence had
estimated that McKesson’s continental European and UK businesses combined could
be valued at $3 billion to $4 billion.
Texas-based McKesson is one of three dominant drug
distributors in the US, alongside AmerisourceBergen and Cardinal Health, and
has played a key role in distributing Covid-19 vaccines.
The company said earlier this year that delivering vaccines
and other supplies for fighting the virus would lead to stronger earnings in
2021.
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