Abu Dhabi’s Mubadala part of consortium purchasing Bain’s Hugel stake for $1.5bn

South Korean cosmetic pharmaceutical company Hugel said its largest investor, Bain Capital, has signed a deal to sell a 46.9 per cent stake to a consortium led by private equity firm CBC Group.

The deal, one of the largest medical aesthetics transactions in Asia, is worth around 1.7 trillion won ($1.5bn), including convertible bonds, Seoul-based Hugel said in a statement on Wednesday. Abu Dhabi-based investment company Mubadala and South Korea’s IMM Investment Corp. and GS Holdings Corp. are also part of the bidding group, the filing shows, confirming an earlier report by Bloomberg News.

We recently invested in Korea’s largest medical aesthetics company, Hugel, as part of a consortium led by CBC Group, Asia’s largest healthcare-dedicated investment firm. pic.twitter.com/YHhfCdVzgv

— Mubadala (@Mubadala) August 25, 2021

Hugel shares tumbled as much as 9 per cent in early Seoul trading Wednesday after the announcement. GS Holdings rose 0.91 per cent as of 11.04am local time.

The South Korean company mainly produces beauty goods including botulinum toxin, commonly known as botox, and hyaluronic acid filler, its website shows. It also makes cosmetics and medical devices.

Hugel’s Botox product ‘Letybo’ was approved by China’s drug regulator in October 2020 after it filed an application in 2019. It is the fourth Botox product approved by China, where the aesthetic-medicine market is set to reach 31.5 billion yuan ($4.9bn) in revenue by 2023, according to a Deloitte report.

Hong Kong-listed Sihuan Pharmaceutical Holdings is currently the sole agent for Letybo in China.

The acquisition is healthcare buyout fund CBC’s first move into the medical aesthetics sector. The Singapore-based firm invests across sectors including biopharmaceuticals, medtech and services, including Hong Kong-listed Everest Medicines Ltd. and Nasdaq-listed I-Mab.

“This marks the beginning of CBC’s journey into the global medical aesthetics sector, in addition to our current pharma, medtech and services exposure,” the firm’s Managing Director Michael Keyoung said in a statement.