PARIS (Reuters) -French drugmaker Sanofi said on Thursday it was “surprised” by a renewed, higher offer for its consumer arm Opella from private equity firm PAI Partners, saying the move came after the bidding deadline for the business had passed.
PAI is seeking to outbid U.S. rival Clayton Dubilier & Rice (CD&R) for a controlling 50% stake in Opella, the maker of one of France’s most-sold painkillers, Doliprane, a source earlier told Reuters, confirming media reports.
Sanofi remained reserved, saying in a statement sent to journalists on Thursday that it was “surprised that an ‘improved offer’ is being made now, outside the timeframe and the governance process that framed the decision.”
All candidates had the same opportunity to submit their best offers within the process deadline, the company said.
BID HIKED BY 2OO MILLION EUROS
The source told Reuters that the PAI-led consortium had hiked its bid by 200 million euros ($217.2 million) in a revised offer sent earlier on Thursday to Sanofi Chairman Frederic Oudea.
It said the new bid is valid until Sunday night, but declined to elaborate on the exact price offered for the stake in Opella, which is valued at more than 15 billion euros.
CD&R declined to comment.
Sanofi, France’s biggest pharmaceutical group, said last week that it was in talks with CD&R for the sale of a 50% controlling stake in Opella, triggering criticism from both the right and left of France’s political spectrum over concerns France could lose a strategic asset.
The French government made pledges during the COVID-19 pandemic to restore self-sufficiency in healthcare. Labour unions had called for a strike at Sanofi’s plants in France on Thursday amid fears a sale to CD&R could result in job losses.
“Doliprane must stay in France. It belongs to the French,” CFDT union coordinator and Sanofi production technician Adil Bensetra said outside the Compiegne plant in northern France during Thursday’s protest.
“We have already given up too much in terms of French industry. … We cannot give up health,” he said.
“We have elections in the United States with a Donald Trump who has always had an ‘American First’ policy,” he added. “(Trump) could say that all the manufacturing today of these products that are made in France and Europe should be relocated to the United States.”
In its revised bid, PAI pledged to preserve headcount and raise investments at Opella’s French production sites of Lisieux in Normandy and Compiegne, the source said. It also vowed to keep Opella’s headquarters in France, the same source added.
($1 = 0.9204 euros)
(Reporting by Mathieu Rosemain, Dominique Patton and Lucien Libert; Editing by Mark Potter, Jan Harvey and Mark Porter)
