Quotient Clinical (‘Quotient’ or ‘the Company’), a provider of outsourced, early-stage drug development services to the global pharmaceutical industry, has been sold by Bridgepoint Development Capital (‘BDC’) to GHO Capital for an undisclosed sum. The sale has generated a strong money multiple for BDC and is its 3rd realisation this year.

Headquartered in Nottingham and employing over 280 professionals, Quotient enables pharmaceutical and biotechnology customers to improve research and development productivity, achieve significant cost savings and bring drug products to market faster.

The Company's differentiated service proposition, known as Translational Pharmaceutics®, offers an integrated approach to drug formulation development, "real-time" manufacturing and clinical testing, all within a single location. This means that its customers are able to reduce development timelines and costs by conserving drug substance through more precise dose selection and formulation modification in response to emerging clinical data. It also simplifies the supply chain for customers.

Quotient has a strong customer base, providing support to a range of top-tier pharmaceutical companies and small-medium sized biotechnology companies. The Company has 52,000 ft2 of integrated operating facilities in Nottingham for pharmaceutical sciences and clinical trials, and a data sciences function based in Edinburgh which includes medical writing, statistics and programming. Quotient's state-of-the-art facilities are approved to Good Manufacturing Practice (GMP) and Good Clinical Practice (GCP) standards with scalable technologies and processes.

Alan Payne, partner of Bridgepoint Development Capital, said: "Our investment in Quotient was a significant opportunity for the management team to help it grow the company's capability, grow its market share as well as refine its international strategy and business model. It has done all of these and more, increasing its market penetration, especially in the large pharma sector, and creating an attractive, high growth platform."

Mark Egerton, Chief Executive Officer of Quotient Clinical, commented: "Quotient Clinical has delivered exceptional growth over the past three years and our unique offering is set to continue to drive international demand. We now have a robust platform from which to enhance our services on a global scale. Having worked with BDC as a supportive shareholder during this period, we now look forward to working with another at this pivotal phase in Quotient's growth strategy."

The outsourced early-stage drug development market is expected to grow strongly over the next five years, primarily driven by growth in the number of compounds entering development, a favourable funding environment for biotechnology companies and new challenges in drug development. With attractive market dynamics and a global customer base, Quotient is strongly positioned to deliver international growth.

HSBC Bank plc provided debt financing for the transaction. Advisers involved in the transaction included:

For GHO Capital : Macfarlanes LLP (legal), PwC (accounting),

For Quotient: Travers Smith (legal)

For BDC: Travers Smith (legal)