The sale of FairJourney Biologics has moved to the second round and the company has attracted the interest of private equity firms Advent International and KKR & Co [NYSE:KKR], sources familiar with the situation said.

The Portuguese contract research organisation (CRO), backed by specialist healthcare sponsor GHO Capital, had mandated JP Morgan earlier this year, as reported.

The process timeline has been fluid with deadlines being pushed back, but is now in the binding-offers (BOs) stage, sources said. One source pointed to a 24 May date for BOs in the process letter, though this has been pushed back to the end of June, another source said.

The process has been competitive and has other bidders, such as Partners Group [SWX:PGHN], two of the sources said, while one source mentioned the involvement of a Nordic fund.

The vendors have valuation expectations of 20X EBITDA and Fairjourney’s EBITDA is expected to reach EUR 45m this year, according to a press article.

Specifica, which was sold to IQVIA, is a good benchmark comparison for FairJourney, one of the sources said. FairJourney is a unique business and in an area with really fast growth, this source added.

FairJourney has a score of 70 out of 100, according to Mergermarket‘s Likely to Exit (LTE) predictive algorithm.*

The company is a biologics CRO, providing integrated services across antibody discovery, engineering and production to global biopharmaceutical players, according to GHO’s website.

GHO invested in the business in early 2020 via the EUR 975m GHO Capital Fund II, a 2019-vintage fund, according to Mergermarket data.

The fund subsequently sold a minority stake in UK-based contract development and manufacturing organisation (CDMO) Sterling Pharma to Partners Group in May 2023, and still holds Belgian CDMO Ardena and British medical communications company Envision Pharma Group, according to the same data.

GHO, FairJourney, and JPMorgan did not reply to requests for comment. Advent, KKR and Partners declined to comment.

*Mergermarket’s LTE predictive analytics assign a score to sponsor-backed companies to help track and predict when an exit could occur through M&A, an IPO, a direct listing or a deSPAC transaction.