YMC to acquire pharmaceutical systems’ business from LEWA-NIKKISO group

The acquisition complements YMC’s existing offering of chromatography columns, systems, services and consumables and allows YMC to strengthen its reach in North America and expand its global systems’ business. The transaction includes staff and assets dedicated to the development, manufacture and sales of batch and continuous HPLC, LPLC, SMB and buffer / caustic dilution systems for the bio/pharmaceutical market. This includes the manufacturing site located in Devens, MA, USA. Terms of the agreement were not made public.

Better position to capture global growth trends

Together with this group, YMC expects to offer its global customers an even more comprehensive portfolio of purification-enabling products. YMC’s global sales reach is expected to accelerate the former LEWA bio/pharmaceutical group’s business. The combined operations will be well positioned to capture global growth trends, such as growing demand for continuous processing.

LEWA remains a key element of the business through a long term pump supply arrangement. The LEWA pumps are a basis for the EcoPrime LPLC, HPLC, SMB, Continuous Chromatography and BID systems. The deal includes the transfer of licenses with ChromaCon AG and Bayer AG that support the bio/pharmaceutical systems business and certain non-compete clauses.

First American-based manufacturing for YMC

Ryuji Yamamura, Chief Executive Officer of YMC says, “LEWA has a truly unique and differentiated positioning with its EcoPrime systems and strong awareness among end users, especially those pursuing continuous processing of pharmaceuticals and biopharmaceuticals. Through this acquisition, we will create the first American-based manufacturing for YMC. In addition, we believe that acquiring LEWA’s extensive experience in precision purification systems and automation for GMP scale equipment can unlock YMC’s mostly untapped growth potential for systems outside of Asia. We are confident that this addition to our portfolio will strengthen our platform and provide an additional vehicle for driving long-term, sustainable growth. It is our intent to retain the full complement of resources at this site and grow the business through bringing more products into the facility.”

Peter Castellanos, CEO, LNA, says, “LEWA had great success in gaining industry recognition as an innovative purification systems’ player in the bioprocess space in a short period of time. After being approached by YMC we realized their product portfolio is well positioned to take the next phase of growth for this group. We remain strategically aligned to this business through the supply of our pumps and we are committed to facilitating the seamless transition of the business to YMC. Existing customers should see no disruption in present production.”

The business transition is expected to close in Q4 2018 according to business representatives.