Acquisitions within the Orthopedic Industry Increase
BY JOHN CHOPACK, FEBRUARY 27, 2006
dj Orthopedics announced that it had signed a definitive agreement to purchase Aircast Incorporated for $290 million in an all cash transaction. Aircast is a leading designer and manufacturer of ankle braces and vascular systems. Aircast booked $96.8 million in revenues and $24.4 million in EBITDA during 2005. This values the transaction at 3.0x trailing revenues and 11.9x trailing EBITDA.
Wachovia Securities acted as financial advisor for dj Orthopedics and Wachovia Bank, NA provided a senior debt financing for the acquisition. The transaction is anticipated to close March 30, 2006.
This represents the fifth transaction within the orthopedic industry in 2006. Last week, OrthoLogic announced its purchase of certain assets and assumption of certain liabilities of AzERxk Inc. in a cash and stock deal. OrthoLogic agreed to pay $390,000 in cash and approximately $7.7 million as of the Company's closing share price on Thursday, February 23, 2006.
The three other transactions included Depuy's acquisition of Hand Innovations, Stryker's acquisition of PlasmaSol and Kyphon's purchase of InnoSpine.
