Botox maker to get Bain facelift
Bain Capital has agreed to invest about $816m in Hugel to gain control of the South Koreanbased maker of beauty products, including botox.
Hugel shares rose by the most in five months, pacing gains by a rival maker of the antiwrinkle treatment.
Bain will pay 354.7-billion won ($312m) for 985,217 new shares in Hugel and 100-billion won in convertible bonds, according to regulatory filings and an e-mailed statement from Hugel. Hugel shares jumped 8.8%, the most since November 8, to 396,000 won at the close in Seoul. Medy-Tox climbed 6.7%.
The deals would give Bain control of a supplier with an estimated 30% of the botulinum toxin market in South Korea, a global leader in cosmetic procedures and surgery. The Bostonbased private equity investor agreed to buy Stada Arzneimittel, Hugel’s European sales partner, last week in a $5.6bn deal in partnership with London-based rival Cinven.
SOUTH KOREA, WHICH HAS ABOUT 51-MILLION PEOPLE, HAD 1.2MILLION COSMETIC PROCEDURES IN 2015
The new stock is priced at about 360,000 won a share, 1.1% less than the April 14 closing price. Bain, which is also in talks to buy Hugel’s largest shareholder Tongyang for 472.8billion won, will own 45.3% of Hugel if the transactions are completed as planned.
Hugel’s operating profit will probably rise 32% to 83.5-billion won this year, based on the average of analyst estimates, as sales surge 30% to 161.3billion won. Profit was 63.3billion won last year, triple the 2015 total.
South Korea, which has about 51-million people, had 1.2million cosmetic procedures in 2015, the highest total after Brazil and the US, International Society of Aesthetic Plastic Surgery figures for 2015 show.
Botulinum toxin, marketed under names including Botox, Dysport and Xeomin, was ranked as the world’s most popular cosmetic procedure in 2015, tallying 4.6-million cases, according to the society.
Meanwhile, potential rescuers of Japan’s Takata had extended talks, already in their 14th month, for a deal to take over the airbag maker at the heart of the motor industry’s biggest safety recall, people briefed on the process said.
Car-parts maker Key Safety Systems (KSS) and Bain Capital are the preferred bidder for Takata, whose faulty airbags have been blamed for at least 16 deaths worldwide.
Discussions that include the steering committee tapped by the maker to oversee the search for a financial sponsor, clients, suitors and bankers are now likely to run on until end-May.