Kartesia takes control of ADL Biopharma

The investment includes the conversion of €6m of debt into equity, in accordance with a previous restructuring agreement.

According to the deal, the company's board of directors has been reduced to three seats, comprising the three independent directors appointed by Kartesia in October: Raúl Crespo, Ignacio Urbelz and Mirco Iwan. In its first meeting, the board appointed Urbelz as new CEO.

Kartesia had initially provided the company with a €25m debt package in August 2019. 

Subsequently, the firm acquired a 51% stake in ADL Biopharma in October 2020 from its parent company, ADL Bionatur Solutions, a Madrid-listed business that is controlled by Black Toro Capital. The deal included a new debt tranche of €5m made available by Kartesia at closing for the general corporate purposes of ADL.

The deal also specified a commitment from the shareholders to approve a capital increase of at least €10m, pro rata of the stake of each party, and an amend and extend facility of the senior financing.

The capital increase was subsequently expanded with the addition of €2m, to fund committed investments in additional production capacity for a new client.

Previous funding
Black Toro took over the production unit of biopharmaceutical company Antibioticos in 2014, acquiring the business out of insolvency. The new company started operating under the name Antibioticos de Leon and was subsequently rebranded as ADL Biopharma.

The company was merged through a reverse acquisition with Madrid-listed Bionaturis Solutions, an animal health specialist, in November 2017. Following the merger, Black Toro controlled an 85.7% stake in the new entity, rebranded it as ADL Bionatur Solutions and listed the company on the alternative equity market of the Spanish stock exchange.

The company raised a €12m funding round from Spanish institutional and qualified investors in July 2018, issuing 5,454,546 new shares at a price of 220 cents per share. Following this offer, ADL's free-float increased to around 20%, while Black Toro held 73.23% and Víctor Infante, founder of Bionaturis, kept 5.08%.

Company
ADL is a biotechnological company specialising in fermentation and microbiology for the health sector. It employs 290 staff across a manufacturing plant in León, three research facilities in Jerez, San Sebastián and Barcelona, and a sales office in Boston, Massachusetts. The business generated revenues of €45.3m in 2019.

ADL Biopharma is the biopharmaceutical division of ADL and is focused on the development and production of antibiotics, as well as products and intermediates obtained from precision fermentation processes for the food, cosmetics and pharma industries.

The business operates one of the largest facilities for industrial fermentation in Europe and a new pilot plant to develop novel molecules.

People
Kartesia – Jaime Prieto (founding partner).
ADL Biopharma – Ignacio Urbelz (CEO).

Advisers
Acquirer – Linklaters (debt advisory, corporate finance).

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• Topics
• Expansion
• Southern Europe
• Healthcare
• Kartesia
• Spain