WILMINGTON—Wilmington-based contract research organization Pharmaceutical Product Development is considering a sale that could value the company at $5 billion, the Wall Street Journal reports.
Citing unnamed sources close to the company, the WSJ said the company has hired Goldman Sachs Group, J.P. Morgan Chase & Co., and Centerview Partners to find a buyer.
A deal could happen as soon as the first quarter the sources told the Journal.
The company, owned by private-equity firms Carlyle Group and Hellman & Freidman, could go public instead but no IPO preparations are active.
They purchased the company for $4 billion in 2011. Through acquisitions and hiring it has added about 8,000 employees since the purchase, and has a total of about 19,000.
The company, the Journal sources said, expects to report about $700 million in earnings on $2.8 billion in revenue in 2017.
