Expedeon AG: Expedeon AG signs EUR 120 million deal with Abcam for the sale of its immunology and proteomics business

DGAP-News: Expedeon AG / Key word(s): Contract

11.11.2019 / 08:31
The issuer is solely responsible for the content of this announcement.

PRESS RELEASE
11 November 2019
 

Expedeon AG signs EUR 120 million deal with Abcam for the sale of its immunology and proteomics business

Conference call to be held today, 11November 2019, 11 a.m. CET/10 a.m. GMT

Heidelberg, Germany and Cambridge, UK, 11 November 2019 - Expedeon AG (Frankfurt: EXNN; ISIN: DE000A2YN801; Prime Standard) announces the signing of an agreement with Abcam plc (London Stock Exchange: ABC; ISIN: GB00B6774699; AIM MTF), Cambridge, UK, to sell its proteomics and immunology business activities for a cash payment of EUR 120 million. This purchase price is equivalent to twice Expedeon's current market capitalization or excess of 9-times 2018 annual group revenue. The agreement is subject to shareholder approval at an extraordinary meeting of Expedeon AG to be held in Heidelberg on December 19th, 2019.

The agreement covers the sale and transfer of all shares in Expedeon Holdings Limited (Cambridge, UK), organised in three divisions: the proteomics-focused Expedeon Ltd. and the two subdivisions within Expedeon's immunology portfolio, Innova Biosciences Ltd. (Cambridge, UK) and TGR BioSciences Pty Ltd. (Thebarton, Australia). Expedeon Inc (San Diego, USA) will be transferred from the Expedeon Holding Ltd. prior to the sale to become part of Expedeon AG (Heidelberg, Germany), the listed entity and parent company of Expedeon Holdings Ltd. Expedeon Inc. will transfer the non-electrophoretic instrument assets to the purchaser. Following the transaction, Expedeon AG will change its corporate name and branding, which will be proposed to the extraordinary meeting.

"We are very pleased to announce the signing of this deal with our longstanding partner Abcam, subject to our shareholders' approval. Our grow, buy and build strategy of the past years has helped us create an attractive portfolio of innovative products and services in proteomics and immunology. In turn, we have now realised significant value for our company with the planned sale of this portfolio to Abcam", said Dr. Heikki Lanckriet, CEO of Expedeon AG. "The remaining business will focus on new attractive growth markets. With our strong intellectual property (IP) and genomics business know-how, we are determined to build a leading DNA manufacturing firm taking a novel, cell-free approach that offers significant advantages over the classic fermenter-based method and unlocks a growing market in the gene therapy field. The gross proceeds from the transaction with Abcam will provide us with the necessary financial resources for this strategy," Dr. Lanckriet concluded.

Expedeon AG will retain approximately 38 % of its assets at the level of individual financial statements and 15 % at the level of consolidated financial statements. In the future, the Company will use parts of the proceeds of this transaction to apply its proven grow, buy and build strategy to its genomics business that it will continue to pursue through the remaining Spanish operation Expedeon Biotech S.L.U. (Madrid, Spain) and that is driven by its proprietary TruePrime(TM) technology. Future activities will include DNA manufacturing and establishing GMP certified facilities to supply DNA products for research, therapeutic and other uses requiring large amounts of high purity DNA, such the fast-growing market of novel gene therapies.

Unlike conventional therapies where small molecules, proteins and antibodies are the typical active ingredients, DNA delivers the cure in gene therapies. The production of gene therapies and gene vaccines requires large quantities of high-quality DNA. Synthetic DNA is thus expected to drive the development of the therapeutic products market towards USD 38 billion by 2020. Currently, the market is growing at an annual rate (CAGR) of 44%. Further business activities will address the research tools market. More specifically, reverse transcriptases currently has an annual volume of USD 266 million. The isothermal DNA amplification market segment had a 2015 volume of USD 266 million and a CAGR of 13.5 %. Last, Expedeon AG expects to be able to address certain segments of the diagnostics products market, e.g. the liquid biopsy segment with estimated USD 2 billion (2022), annually growing at 20 %.

The following graphic illustrates how the assets will be divided, with the blue boxes representing the assets remaining at Expedeon AG and the grey boxes representing the items to be sold to Abcam plc:

Table 1: Expedeon Corporate Structure as of October 2019; Deal is subject to Expedeon shareholder approval.

Conference call details:

Expedeon AG will host a conference call today, 11 November 2019, at 11 a.m. Central European Time (CET) / 10 a.m. Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) to present a short update on recent company development, details of the agreement with Abcam plc and future perspectives, including a strategic update and financial outlook.

Interested parties can access the conference call via the following telephone numbers:

* From Germany: +49 (0) 30 3001 90612

* From Spain: +34 91 788 9854

* From the US: 1 866 966 5335

* From the UK and other countries: +44 (0) 20 3003 2666

When prompted, please provide the password "Expedeon".

The conference call, which is also being webcast, will be accompanied by a slide presentation which can be accessed during the call here: http://view-w.tv/819-1579-22769/en

Please dial in 5 minutes before the beginning of the event.

A conference call recording will be available on www.investors.expedeon.com.

For further information, please contact:

Expedeon AG
Dr. Heikki Lanckriet
CEO
Phone: +44 1223 873 364
Email: heikki.lanckriet@expedeon.com
Investor website: www.investors.expedeon.com

MC Services AG (Investor Relations and International Media Relations)
Raimund Gabriel
Managing Partner
Phone: +49 89 210228 0
Email: expedeon@mc-services.eu

About Expedeon AG: www.investors.expedeon.com
Expedeon is an enabler of exciting advances in medical science and patient care. The Company's core technologies, innovative products and services are used in research laboratories around the world, enabling scientists to push the boundaries of research and product development, and play an integral part in new diagnostic tools being brought to market. With applications spanning the entire workflows in genomics, proteomics and immunology, Expedeon's technologies both accelerate and simplify research and make new and cost-effective processes available to biopharmaceutical and diagnostic organisations alike, thereby underpinning its customers' development and commercialisation objectives. Expedeon's products are sold through a direct sales force and several distribution partners in Europe, the USA and Asia. Expedeon AG has offices in Germany, Spain, UK, USA and Singapore. The Company is listed on the Prime Standard segment of the Frankfurt Stock Exchange (Ticker: EXNN; ISIN: DE000A2YN801).

### This publication is intended for information only and constitutes neither an offer to sell nor an invitation to buy securities. Some statements included in this press release, relating neither to proven financial results nor other historical data, should be viewed as forward-looking, i.e. not definite. Such statements are mainly predictions of future results, trends, plans or goals. These statements should not be considered to be total guarantees since given their very nature they are subject to known and unknown risks and imponderability and can be affected by other factors as a consequence of which the actual results, plans and goals of Expedeon AG may deviate greatly from the established conclusions or implied predictions contained in such statements. Expedeon does not undertake to publicly update or revise these statements in the light of new information or future results or for any other reason. ###

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