Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc. acquires Patheon N.V. for US$7.2B

On August 29, 2017, Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc., the world leader in serving science, announced that it had completed its acquisition of Patheon N.V., a leading contract development and manufacturing organization (CDMO) serving the pharmaceutical and biotechnology sectors, for a price of approximately US$7.2 billion (approximately C$8.9 billion). At 5:00 p.m., New York City time on August 28, 2017, the initial tender offer period for Thermo Fisher (CN) Luxembourg S.à r.l. — a wholly owned subsidiary of Thermo Fisher (the Purchaser) — to acquire all of the outstanding ordinary shares of Patheon expired. The Purchaser had acquired a total of 138,406,058 ordinary shares at the initial expiration time, representing approximately 95.3 per cent of Patheon’s outstanding ordinary shares. 

Thermo Fisher was represented by an in-house team led by Jonathan Wilk, John Piccione and Seth Hoogasian. Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz acted as corporate counsel in the US with a team that included Matthew guest, Jacob Kling, Avi Sutton and Anna Greig (M&A). Axinn, Veltrop & Harkrider LLP acted as regulatory counsel with a team that included John Harkrider, Mark Alexander and James Goldfeier (competition). Blake, Cassels & Graydon LLP acted as legal counsel in Canada with a team that included Julie Soloway and Peter Flynn (competition). 

Patheon was represented by an in-house team led by Eric Sherbet and Jason Conner. Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP represented Patheon in the US with a team that included Bob Pincus, Faiz Ahmad, Paul Bennett, Rebecca Guzman, Matthew Gerber and Stephen Morrissey (M&A) and Ken Schwartz, Brian Mohr, Frederic Depoortere and Nicholas Barnabo (competition), while Stikeman Elliott LLP acted as legal counsel in Canada with a team that included Jeffrey Brown, Mike Kilby and William Wu (competition).