EQT agreed to acquire the European molecular testing company at €46.50 a share in cash through Crown NL Bidco BV, which is indirectly controlled by an EQT fund. Affiliates of the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority and the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board are also taking part in the offer.
The price represents roughly a 40% uplift versus where Qiagen traded prior to news articles flagging a possible deal. In New York trading, the US-listed shares rose 2.3% to $50, or €44.51.
Competition surfaced along the way, with KKR & Co. also making a bid. According to Bloomberg, Switzerland-based PSquared Asset Management, among the 25 largest shareholders, pushed for any pact to come in above $50 per share. This is not Qiagen's first run at a sale: Thermo Fisher Scientific put up a $12 billion offer in 2020, then dropped it after activist opposition left the tender short of the needed support.
Qiagen is incorporated in the Netherlands with primary offices in Hilden, Germany, and supplies tools and services that help analyze genetic material for hundreds of thousands of customers, from pharmaceutical R&D teams to clinical labs.
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This transaction stands among the year's biggest in European healthcare, signaling that private equity still has appetite for scale in lab and diagnostics platforms. It also lands amid a busy stretch for EQT, which this week agreed to acquire Australia's Cleanaway Waste Management Ltd for A$9.3 billion and, over the summer, agreed to acquire tester Intertek Group Plc, which is listed in the UK, for £9.3 billion.
The bottom line: a firm, all-cash bid at €46.50 sets a clear marker for Qiagen holders, while the broader sector sees another data point for valuations and exit optionality.
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