Partners Group Completes Majority-Share Purchase of Wedgewood Pharmacy

SWEDESBORO N.J.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Leading global private-markets firm Partners Group has, on behalf of its clients, completed its purchase of the majority equity share of Wedgewood Pharmacy, the largest compounding pharmacy in the U.S. devoted to animal health. The signing of an agreement to purchase was announced previously on December 19, 2020. The firm replaces New Harbor Capital as the majority shareholder. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed.

Marcy A. Bliss, CEO of Wedgewood Pharmacy, said: “This partnership begins a new and expanding chapter in our company’s long history of improving the lives of animals and the people who love them. We have ambitious plans to continue responding to veterinarians and the needs of their patients.”

Future investments include:

• New product development, ensuring access to backordered medications, as well as personalized medicine to treat vulnerable (and finicky) animal patients.
• Process and technology improvements that make Wedgewood Pharmacy the easiest to do business with.
• Increased production at the company’s FDA-registered 503B Outsourcing Facility, Wedgewood Connect, to ensure adequate availability of medication for office use.
• Logistics and operational investments that will speed delivery of medication to patients and prescribers.

Chris Russell, managing director of Partners Group, added: “Wedgewood Pharmacy's animal-health niche in compounding pharmacy fits well with our thematic focus on healthcare and our portfolio of healthcare-related companies, which includes Blue River Pet Care, one of the leading operators of veterinary hospitals for companion animals. We are looking forward to our collaboration with Wedgewood Pharmacy’s excellent management team to implement new transformational value-creation initiatives, further solidifying the company’s leadership position.”

About Wedgewood Pharmacy

Wedgewood Pharmacy is the largest compounding pharmacy devoted to animal health in the United States. Compounding is the long-established tradition in pharmacy practice that enables practitioners to prescribe and patients to take medicines that are specially prepared by pharmacists to meet patients' individual needs. A growing number of patients have unique health and compliance needs that off-the-shelf prescription medicines cannot meet. For them, customized, compounded medications prescribed or ordered by licensed physicians or veterinarians and prepared safely by trained, licensed compounding pharmacists and pharmacy technicians are the only way to better health.

Compounded medications are created and prepared in state-regulated pharmacies when mass-manufactured drugs are not, according to a prescriber, available or are not appropriate for a patient. Wedgewood Pharmacy’s 503B Outsourcing Facility, Wedgewood Connect, compounds medications under FDA’s modified cGMP standards.

Today’s Wedgewood Pharmacy grew from a local community pharmacy to become one of the largest compounding pharmacies in the United States. It is the leading pharmacy brand in animal health, recognized by 99% of veterinarians, and used by 8 in 10 veterinarians within the past year. It also prepares compounded medications for the human-health medical specialties of Addiction Medicine, Urology, and Ophthalmology. The company serves more than 50,000 prescribers and hundreds of thousands of patients throughout the U.S. every year.

George (late) and Lucy Malmberg, both pharmacists, purchased Wedgewood Pharmacy in 1981, the year after the pharmacy opened. In June 2016, New Harbor Capital became the majority shareholder of the company. In 2018, the company acquired Diamondback Drugs. In 2020, the company purchased and began production at Wedgewood Connect, an FDA-registered 503B Outsourcing Facility, in San Jose, California. In the same year, the company acquired Wildlife Pharmaceuticals and ZooPharm, in Colorado and Wyoming, respectively.

Wedgewood Pharmacy is accredited by the Pharmacy Compounding Accreditation Board (PCAB®) for compliance with PCAB and other nationally recognized compounding standards. PCAB was formed by eight of the nation’s leading pharmacy associations and is a service of Accreditation Commission for Health Care. As a third-party accreditation organization, PCAB has developed the highest national standards against which providers are measured to demonstrate their ability to effectively and efficiently deliver quality compounded medications to consumers.

Wedgewood Pharmacy employs more than 700 people.

About Partners Group

Partners Group is a leading global private markets firm. Since 1996, the firm has invested over USD 145 billion in private equity, private real estate, private debt, and private infrastructure on behalf of its clients globally. Partners Group seeks to generate superior returns through capitalizing on thematic growth trends and transforming attractive businesses and assets into market leaders. The firm is a committed, responsible investor and aims to create sustainable returns with lasting, positive impact for all its stakeholders. With over USD 109 billion in assets under management as of 31 December 2020, Partners Group provides an innovative range of bespoke client solutions to institutional investors, sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and private individuals globally. The firm employs more than 1,500 diverse professionals across 20 offices worldwide and has regional headquarters in Baar-Zug, Switzerland; Denver, USA; and Singapore. It has been listed on the SIX Swiss Exchange since 2006 (symbol: PGHN). For more information, please visit www.partnersgroup.com or follow the company on LinkedIn or Twitter.