Two pharmaceutical companies established in Denmark – Novozymes and Chr Hansen – have notified the Commission of their intention to merge. Now the Commission is seeking the views of interested third parties on whether the merger will lead to conglomerate effects.
Novozymes is a global bioscience company and is predominantly a developer, manufacturer and supplier of industrial enzymes to be used within household care, bioenergy, grain & tech processing, agriculture and animal health & nutrition, and food & beverage and, to a lesser extent, a manufacturer of probiotics for human and animal health and biologicals for plant health.
Chr Hansen is a global differentiated bioscience company that develops natural ingredients solutions for the food, nutritional, pharmaceutical and agricultural industries for a variety of foods, beverages, dietary supplements, animal feed and crop protection. The Chr. Hansen Group is predominantly a manufacturer and supplier of cultures for food & beverage, but, to a lesser extent, also manufactures probiotics for human and animal health, biologicals for plant health and enzymes.
Both Novozymes and Chr Hansen are principally owned by Novo Holdings, which is the holding company for the Novo Nordisk Foundation. Novo Holdings also owns a large stake in Novo Nordisk.
The Commission’s are seeking the views of interested third parties after formal notification was made under Regulation 139/2004 (Control of Concentrations Regulation).
The Commission is particularly interested on views regarding any overlap in the goods and products of the companies with the same intended use. This could, if significant overlap was established, lead to conglomerate effects, with negative retrocessions on product innovation.
Ultimately, the Commission will have to decide whether to approve the intended merger or not.
For interested third parties on the Commission’s scrutiny of the merger, they have 10 days from 31 October 2023 to make their submissions to the Commission. The relevant information was published in yesterday’s Official Journal here.