W R Grace sells chromatography instruments, columns and related product lines
Intends to focus on growing its pharma and nutraceutical business
W R Grace, a global supplier of catalysts and engineered materials, is to sell its chromatography instruments, columns, and related laboratory products businesses that are not aligned with the company’s plans for growth.
Grace says it will continue to supply Vydac and Davisil media for process chromatography, Syloid FP excipients for drug formulations, and custom manufacturing of regulatory starting materials and intermediates.
'Grace has determined that the best way to ensure that former and future customers are provided with high-value products and first-class service is to move these laboratory product lines to companies for which they are a better match,' said Robert Gatte, Vice President, Chief Technologist, and General Manager of Grace’s Discovery Sciences business unit.
'For Grace, this means concentrating on our core materials science and manufacturing capabilities. For lab products customers, it means working with companies that serve B-to-C markets for equipment that will continue to utilise Grace media.'
The best way to ensure that customers are provided with high-value products and first-class service is to move these laboratory product lines to companies for which they are a better match
Grace will sell its flash chromatography and ELSD instrument business to Buchi, a division of Buchi Labortechnik, a Swiss manufacturer and global supplier of laboratory equipment to the pharma, chemicals, and food/beverage industries. The sale includes Reveleris purification systems, GraceResolv and Reveleris flash cartridges, and Alltech ELSD 3300 instrumentation. Grace is now the exclusive supplier of media for use in these flash cartridge brands from Buchi.
Dr Maisch, a German company specialising in high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC), has agreed to purchase Grace’s line of analytical HPLC columns, preparative columns, and packing equipment and services. This includes Exsil, Modsil and Exmeret media, the Alltech HPLC column brands Adsorbosphere, Allsphere, Brava, Econosphere, Gracesmart, Platinum, and VisionHT brands. Grace will continue to supply media and provide media bonding services for these column brands. Also included in the purchase are the MODcol brands including Spring preparative column hardware, Multipacker packing equipment and packing services.
Additional Grace HPLC column brands, including Vydac, will be sold exclusively by Hichrom in the UK. In addition to selling Vydac analytical columns, Hichrom will acquire Grace’s Alltima, Allsep, Apex, Apollo, Genesis, and Prevail HPLC column brands. Grace will continue to supply media to Hichrom for these column brands.
Grace also has agreed to sell its Grace and Alltech solid phase extraction (SPE) cartridge brands Maxi-Clean, Extract-Clean, and Gracepure brands to S*Pure, a laboratory and scientific equipment supplier based in Singapore. The related Grace manufacturing facility in Surat, India is included in the transaction. Grace will continue to supply SPE media to S*Pure.
No financial details about any of the transactions have been released.