Earlier this month, Goodwin Procter client Gallus BioPharmaceuticals completed its acquisition of an FDA-approved, commercially certified biologics manufacturing facility in St. Louis from Centocor Biologics. In connection with the acquisition, Gallus signed a supply agreement with Centocor, a subsidiary of Johnson & Johnson, to manufacture and supply two of Centocor’s leading commercial products, Remicade and Stelara, which are distributed globally.
Gallus received equity financing from Ridgemont Equity Partners and other individual investors; commitments for debt financing from Enterprise Bank; and additional funding through various state and local public financing and government incentive programs to finance the facility acquisition and provide working capital. The funds are expected to allow Gallus to hire 160 former Centocor employees who currently work at the facility and to create an additional 160 new jobs, a result that received significant press attention in the St. Louis area.
The transaction had a long and interesting history. It started with a back porch conversation between Mark Bamforth, former head of manufacturing at Genzyme, and Goodwin partners John LeClaire and Kingsley Taft about the opportunity to form a start-up to buy the Centocor facility and the need for equity capital to finance the purchase. Over the course of a year, Goodwin’s efforts included legal work on the acquisition, the start-up and private financing of Gallus, and referrals to equity capital investors.
The cross-disciplinary Goodwin Procter deal team was led by partners John LeClaire, Andy Sucoff, Kingsley Taft and Maggie Wong.