Stada Arzneimittel has sold two plants in Russia as it tries to improve production efficiency at two others there.
The German company has sold its OOO Makiz Pharma in Moscow and its OOO Skopin Pharmaceutical Plant in Ryazanskaya to DMN Invest of Moscow in what it calls a "partial management buyout."
The buyers will take on 186 employees from the two manufacturing sites immediately and agreed to take on another 200 that temporarily remain with Stada as production is moved from the two sold plants to other Stada facilities through 2014. The company will continue to supply its customers during the transition.
Terms of the deal were not disclosed but Stada did say it would take a one-time, after-tax charge of €7.3 million (about $9.5 million) in the third quarter. It will take a charge of up to €1 million in 2014 as part of terminating employees who are moving to the new owner.
The future of Stada has been the source of some speculation. The company had indicated earlier that it wanted to expand in Russia. Sources have suggested to Bloomberg that India's Sun Pharmaceuticals has been sizing the German drug company up as a way to expand its own operations.
- here's the release
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