Amersham: Phlexglobal sold by Inflexion to Bridgepoint Development Capital
Inflexion Private Equity, the mid-market private equity investor, has sold Phlexglobal to Bridgepoint Development Capital for £42 million.
BDC announced today it has acquired the market leading healthcare support services company.
Established in 1997, Phlexglobal, headquartered in Amersham and with offices in Philadelphia, delivers a specialist service across the pharmaceutical, biotechnology, medical device and healthcare industries. The company offers a support service for all administrative and operational aspects of the clinical trial process, ranging from document management, and pre and post inspection support to tracking systems support, archiving and training.
Phlexglobal’s main area of expertise is in the management of Trial Master Files (TMFs). A TMF is the collection of all of the essential documents involved in a clinical trial required to demonstrate the compliance with the applicable regulatory requirements. In 2006, Phlexglobal developed its own electronic system, or eTMF, called PhlexEview, which combined with the related services of scanning and archiving, is now the principal thrust of the business.
Employing 230 people in the UK and US, Phlexglobal has relationships with most of the top 10 global pharmaceutical companies.
Alan Payne, partner at Bridgepoint Development Capital, said: "Phlexglobal has delivered consistent revenue and profit growth. With the increasing emergence of technology in the TMF market, the company is now well placed to replicate its eminence in the services market to become the eTMF provider of choice and the leading TMF services brand."
Steven Kent, chairman of Phlexglobal, said: "The outsourced pharmaceutical industry is experiencing strong growth on the back of increased R&D spend and more complex regulation. The Phlexglobal management team have already developed a close working relationship with BDC. We share a strong vision of how we can grow the business rapidly over the next few years by further enhancing our technology and services and extending our geographic reach to new customers."
For the year to December 2013, Phlexglobal reported revenue and EBITDA of £15.3 million and £4.5 million respectively.
Senior debt and working capital facilities to support the transaction were provided by Lloyds Bank Commercial Banking.
Advisers were - for BDC - Travers Smith (legal), DC Advisory (corporate finance), E&Y (financial due diligence)
For vendor - BDO (corporate finance), Gateley (legal).
