By Ben Hirschler and Nadia Damouni
LONDON/NEW YORK, Feb 8 (Reuters) - Britain's GlaxoSmithKline
is one of several groups exploring a potential takeover of Ache
Laboratorios Farmaceuticos, one of Brazil's biggest drugmakers,
people familiar with the matter said.
The privately owned business is attractive to a number of
drug companies looking to increase their footprint in Latin
America and could fetch $3-4 billion, or even more if
competition is keen, they added.
"It's something Glaxo has looked at in the past and they've
been knocking on the door," said one source.
Other drugmakers likely to be interested include Novartis,
Pfizer and Abbott Laboratories, other sources said.
Officials for all four multinational companies declined to
comment. Ache also declined to comment on whether the group
would be sold.
Sources said last week that investment bank Lazard had been
mandated by key shareholders to investigate a sale, although
whether a deal will go ahead is still uncertain given divisions
among the families controlling the company.
The Baptista and Siaulys families, who hired Lazard, are
ready to sell up but the Depieri family would like to hold on to
its stake.
Lazard officials declined to comment on the bank's role in
the process.
Although it ranks fourth in terms of overall Brazilian drug
sales, Ache is the leader in prescription medicines and is also
active in the fast-growing over-the-counter (OTC) business,
where there is keen competition for assets.
Britain's Reckitt Benckiser agreed on Tuesday to pay
Bristol-Myers Squibb $482 million to get its hands on a number
of top-selling OTC remedies in Brazil, Mexico and other parts of
Latin America.
The U.S. drugmaker is less interested in OTC products in
emerging markets than bigger rivals like GSK and Pfizer.
Ache's earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and
amortisation (EBITDA) were 540 million reais ($270 million) in
the year to Sept. 30. 2012, on sales of 1.5 billion reais, and
the company's market position is strong, according to a report
last month by Fitch Ratings.
Assuming earnings for the current year of some $300 million,
a price of $3 billion to $4 billion would be in line with
current valuations for emerging market drug companies of a low-
to mid-double digit multiple of EBITDA, sources said.
($1 = 1.9732 Brazilian reals)
(Additional reporting by Soyoung Kim)
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