Q123 M&A roundtable

In this episode of Molecule to Market, you’ll go inside the outsourcing space of the global drug development sector with:

• Ross Burn, Chief Executive at CatSci
• James Hales, Senior Director at NorthEdge
• Tom Cowap, Managing Director for Pharma Services at Baird

Your host, Raman Sehgal, discusses pharmaceutical and biotechnology supply chain M&A activity with his guests, covering:

• How the market headwinds, continued consolidation and how macro slowdowns are impacting M&A activity in our space…
• Why PE is still very keen on the pharma and biotech ecosystem and how the size and shape of deals and investments in the market have changed.
• How an investment is enabling Ross’ business to accelerate growth in several directions.
• A look forward to geographic shifts, continued biotech outsourcing, and how there maybe riches in the niches of sub-segments of the pharma services ecosystem.

After completing his Ph.D. in 2007, Ross joined AstraZeneca as a Senior Analytical Chemist in process R&D. Ross’ analytical expertise and entrepreneurial mindset were pivotal to the establishment of CatSci Ltd in 2011. Ross became CEO in 2015 and has since led the company’s pivot from a catalyst screening company to the award-winning, PE backed innovation partner for medicines development that it is today. As such, Ross was included on the 2021 edition of The Medicine Maker’s annual Power List of inspirational professionals in the pharmaceutical industry.

James is a Senior Director at NorthEdge and leads the healthcare origination efforts as part of the wider healthcare sector team. He is fortunate to meet with management teams nationally across a number of sub-sectors to understand their plans and to identify new investment opportunities for NorthEdge via growth and development capital, management buy-outs, equity release and buy-and-build opportunities. Prior to joining NorthEdge, James spent seven years in corporate finance at Clearwater International as the Director responsible for generating mid-market opportunities and managing the Deal Origination team.

Tom is a Managing Director in Baird’s European Healthcare Investment Banking team. Tom joined Baird from Alantra where he spent nine years building Alantra’s pharma services coverage effort, providing M&A services for financial sponsors and independently owned, founder backed businesses in the space. Prior to Alantra, Tom worked at PricewaterCoopers in their Financial Due Diligence team. He also served in the British Army (Reserve – 7th Battalion, The Rifles and 4th Battalion, The Yorkshire Regiment). Tom is an ACA and has a Bachelor’s degree in finance from Durham University.

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