Bayer may Sell Radiology Business

As it continues to pursue the acquisition of Monsanto for $62 billion, or possibly more, Germany’s Bayer is seen as potentially exploring a sale of its radiology supplies unit worth more than $3 billion.

Sources told the news agency Reuters that the Leverkusen-based group is in talks with investment banks about hiring a financial adviser to explore alternatives for the radiology supplies business, which generates more than €1.5 billion in revenue from contrast agents and related injection equipment. A sale was said to be one of the options.

Bayer picked up the radiology business in its 2006 acquisition of Berlin-based former pharmaceuticals and chemicals producer Schering. Products include Ultravist, a contrast medium for computer tomography with €318 million in 2015 sales, and Gadovist, a contrast medium for magnetic resonance imaging with sales of €290 million.

US media meanwhile reported last week that Monsanto had refused a presumably higher offer from Bayer, and that the German group has refused to bid even more for the agrochemicals giant unless the latter opens its books. Earlier, Bayer CEO Werner Baumann told a Deutsche Bank conference that talks were continuing in private.

According to the German news magazine Der Spiegel, Baumann’s predecessor at the Bayer helm, Marijn Dekkers, previously warned supervisory board chairman, Werner Wenning, against pursuing Monsanto.

Commenting on the M&A rounds in the agrochemical sector at a press conference of the German chemical industry association Verband der Chemischen Industrie (VCI ) early this year – before Bayer bid for Monsanto – Dekkers, who is still the association’s  president, remarked that the two companies’ corporate cultures were not a good fit.