Chr. Hansen Holding A/S acquires Jennewein Biotechnology

Frank­furt am Main — Baker McKen­zie advi­sed Chr. Hansen Holding A/S (Chr. Hansen) in connec­tion with the acqui­si­tion of all shares in Jenne­wein Biotech­no­lo­gie GmbH (Jenne­wein), a leading company in the market for human milk oligos­ac­cha­ri­des (HMOs). The purchase price amounts to appro­xi­m­ately EUR 310 million (on a debt-free basis). The tran­sac­tion is expec­ted to close before the end of Septem­ber 2020.

Follo­wing the acqui­si­tion, Chr. Hansen plans to invest more than EUR 200 million by 2025, inclu­ding in a new produc­tion faci­lity. This is inten­ded to expand HMO capa­city to meet anti­ci­pa­ted demand.

Jenne­wein is a leading inter­na­tio­nal biotech­no­logy company with a range of products in the field of human milk oligos­ac­cha­ri­des (HMOs) and rare monosac­cha­ri­des such as L‑fucose and sialic acid. Jenne­wein produ­ces a broad port­fo­lio of inno­va­tive HMO products, inclu­ding 2′-fucosyllactose, 3′-fucosyllactose, lacto-N-neote­­tra­ose, and lacto-Ntetra­ose. These are rare sugars used in the food indus­try (espe­ci­ally in infant milk formula), in the phar­maceu­ti­cal indus­try and in the cosme­tics industry.

Chr. Hansen is a leading global life science company deve­lo­ping products based on natu­ral ingre­di­ents for the food, nutri­tion, phar­maceu­ti­cal and agri­cul­tu­ral indus­tries. This includes the deve­lo­p­ment and produc­tion of cultures, enzy­mes, probio­tics and natu­ral colors for a variety of foods, confec­tion­ery, bever­a­ges, dietary supple­ments as well as animal feed and crop protec­tion products. This allows food manu­fac­tu­r­ers, for exam­ple, to reduce the use of chemi­cals and other arti­fi­cial substi­tu­tes, thus crea­ting “more” from “less,” which is what makes the food products in ques­tion special in today’s world. In 2019, Chr. Hansen was ranked the most sustainable company in the world by Corpo­rate Knights.

Advi­sor Chr. Hansen Holding A/S: Baker McKen­zie
Lead Corporate/M&A: Chris­tian Atzler, Foto (Part­ner, Frankfurt)
Team: Corporate/M&A: Dr. Peter Wand (Part­ner, Frank­furt), Dr. Markus Mörtel (Senior Asso­ciate, Frank­furt), Jessica Köhler (Asso­ciate, Frank­furt), Rouven Reuter (Asso­ciate, Frank­furt), Esther Xiang (Asso­ciate, Frankfurt)
Commer­cial: Dr. Johan­nes Teich­mann (Part­ner, Frank­furt), Dr. Ingmar Oltmanns (Asso­ciate, Frank­furt) Rebecca Romig, Isabel Weaver (both Asso­cia­tes, Frankfurt)
IP: Dr. Rembert Niebel (Part­ner, Frank­furt), Alex­an­der Ritter (Senior Asso­ciate, Munich), Lena Weber (Asso­ciate, Frankfurt)
IT: Dr. Holger Lutz (Part­ner, Frank­furt), Dr. Tobias Born (Senior Asso­ciate, Frankfurt)
Regu­la­tory: Dr. Frank Pflü­ger (Part­ner, Frank­furt), Dr. Chris­tian Lebrecht (Asso­ciate, Frankfurt)
Employ­ment: Dr. Chris­tian Reichel (Part­ner, Frank­furt), Dr. Felix Diehl (Asso­ciate, Frankfurt)
Real Estate: Dr. Florian Thamm (Part­ner, Frank­furt), Till Pflug (Asso­ciate, Frankfurt)
Banking & Finance: Dr. Oliver Socher (Part­ner, Frank­furt), Silke Fritz (Coun­sel, Frank­furt), Phil­ipp Thimm (Asso­ciate, Frankfurt)
Foreign Trade Law: Anahita Thoms (Part­ner, Düssel­dorf), Alex­an­der Ehrle (Asso­ciate, Berlin)
Anti­trust: Gavin Bushell (Part­ner, Brussels), Chris­tian Horst­kotte (Part­ner, Düsseldorf)

Inhouse Legal Chr. Hansen: Chris­tel May-Worre (Hørs­holm, Denmark)

About Baker McKenzie
Baker McKenzie’s global Corporate/M&A team advi­ses on more cross-border tran­sac­tions than any other law firm. Most recently, Baker McKen­zie advi­sed GEA on the sale of compres­sor manu­fac­tu­rer Bock to NORD, DBAG on an invest­ment in conga­tec Holding AG, benpac holding ag on the acqui­si­tion of Gallus Group, SAP on the sale of the SAP Digi­tal Inter­con­nect commu­ni­ca­ti­ons unit to Sinch AB, Para­gon Part­ners on the acqui­si­tion of Casto­lin Eutec­tic, Air Liquide on the sale of the Schülke Group to Swedish finan­cial inves­tor EQT, METRO AG on the sale of its China busi­ness and the estab­lish­ment of a stra­te­gic part­ner­ship with Wumei, Bayer AG on the sale of its majo­rity stake in chemi­cal park opera­tor Currenta, SPIE on the acqui­si­tion of OSMO, Toppan Prin­ting Co. Ltd. on its acqui­si­tion of the German Inter­print Group, and Evonik on the sale of its methacry­la­tes group to Advent International.