Is anybody shocked that Walgreens is trying to promote itself — reportedly to non-public fairness agency Sycamore Companions?
Walgreens has been dropping a variety of bucks these days: a whopping $8.6 billion of them in fiscal 2024. Its foray into major care has been a problem forcing it to shut a collection of VillageMD clinics nationwide. Even its pharmacy enterprise has confronted competitors from nimble, on-line pharmacy retailers like Amazon Pharmacy and Mark Cuban’s Price Plus Medication and fallen casualty to drug costs being negotiated.
And buyers have paid consideration to its missteps. Over the previous 5 years, the inventory worth of the retail large, if we will even use that time period anymore, has floundered — it’s at the moment buying and selling at lower than $10 down from a excessive of almost $40 on the finish of 2019.
So, when the Wall Road Journal reported final week that Deerfield, Illinois-based Walgreens is exploring a sale, the struggling retailer’s shares jumped by about 17% that day.
If a deal had been to happen, there could possibly be a possible buyout of about $9.2 billion to $10 billion, wrote Erin Wright, an fairness analyst with Morgan Stanley, in a analysis be aware following the WSJ report. It’s slim pickings on condition that the worldwide funding agency KKR made a $70 billion provide to purchase Walgreens in 2019, based on the Monetary Occasions. A report from Pitchbook confirmed that the deal reportedly stalled as a result of KKR and its potential financiers couldn’t agree on Walgreens’ valuation.
Given its diminished standing, is promoting to a personal fairness purchaser a very good transfer for Walgreens?
The reply seems to be “sure” for some specialists.
“At this level, some contemporary considering is required to reconceptualize how the corporate’s property might be extra fruitfully employed,” mentioned Michael Abrams, managing companion of Numerof & Associates, a consulting agency.
Walgreens and Sycamore Companions declined to remark.
Why Walgreens Could Need to Promote Itself
The rumors about Walgreens contemplating a sale come after almost a decade of efforts to revive progress, based on Abrams. Throughout that point, its market worth fell from over $100 billion to under $8 billion, he mentioned.
He added that the corporate has tried quite a few methods to show issues round, together with increasing into Europe with its acquisition of Alliance Boots and shopping for a stake in major care supplier VillageMD for about $5.2 billion.
“The actual fact of the matter is that the pharmacy enterprise is a mature one with flat margins within the core perform of dishing out pharmaceuticals,” Abrams mentioned. “Add to that rising stress from pharmacy profit managers who negotiate drug costs on behalf of insurers and employers, and Walgreens’ extraordinary community of over 12,000 shops is much less an asset than a legal responsibility.”
He added that gross sales for retail merchandise have confronted elevated competitors from Amazon and different e-commerce websites.
The hope is that promoting to a personal fairness agency might assist Walgreens make operational enhancements and develop, based on Keith Campbell, the chief of West Monroe’s merger & acquisition follow. West Monroe is a consulting agency.
“By closing underperforming areas and leveraging sale-and-leaseback transactions, Walgreens might scale back debt and streamline operations,” Campbell mentioned. “As soon as the retail enterprise is stabilized and money circulate optimistic, the main focus might shift to high-growth segments like residence care and uncommon/orphan drug compounding.”
However why Sycamore Companions? In any case, the corporate doesn’t have a lot expertise in healthcare. It has traditionally carried out smaller offers than Walgreens and would in all probability need to dump elements of its enterprise or usher in companions to get the deal by, Abrams identified.
The important thing attraction could possibly be that the New York-based agency makes a speciality of retail and shopper investments. Abrams acknowledged that its portfolio contains workplace provide retailer Staples and clothes shops Sizzling Matter, Ann Taylor and Chico’s.
The truth that Sycamore Companions is extra retail-oriented and consumer-focused is attention-grabbing to Hal Andrews, president and CEO of Trilliant Well being. He famous that the sweetness enterprise at Boots shops in London is simply as distinguished because the pharmacy enterprise, if no more.
“Boots, from simply an expertise standpoint, is way more of a shopper enterprise round well being and wellness and wonder. … However healthcare is a really totally different factor,” he mentioned. “The truth that Sycamore is means that they see a chance to essentially concentrate on the retail aspect, the patron aspect, the well being and wonder a part of the enterprise, and never a lot on the healthcare aspect, whether or not that’s VillageMD or Shields or the rest that’s actually hands-on drugs versus retail well being.”
Is that this the appropriate transfer?
At this level, promoting to a personal fairness purchaser like Sycamore Companions stands out as the proper name for Walgreens, Abrams mentioned.
“Walgreens missed the chance to diversify into the PBM or insurance coverage house years in the past, and so has been on the mercy of others like CVS who did,” he declared. “Their effort to enter the first care house made sense, however the firm underestimated the price and energy concerned in altering the general public’s expectations to see the native drug retailer as a care supplier.”
One other advisor echoed Abrams’ feedback, noting that the faltering retail large must make a strategic change with a purpose to keep away from “additional decline.”
“I believe proper now a personal fairness proprietor might doubtlessly drive the wanted adjustments, corresponding to a larger concentrate on e-commerce, rethinking the retail footprint, and pursuing M&A to broaden into adjoining healthcare providers,” mentioned Howard Gutman, non-public fairness technique and protection lead for MorganFranklin Consulting. “Nevertheless, efficiently executing this transformation would require Walgreens to develop new capabilities round digital operations, M&A integration, and managing a extra diversified enterprise mannequin. That is another excuse I believe the transfer in direction of discovering the appropriate non-public fairness companion is sensible.”
Andrews of Trilliant Well being acknowledged that he can’t say for certain whether or not that is the appropriate transfer for Walgreens. As an govt, nonetheless, he did be aware that when an organization must restructure a enterprise, it’s a lot simpler to try this once you’re privately held and never reporting to Wall Road each 90 days.
“It permits the administration group to simply concentrate on the goals and never fear about what Wall Road’s gonna say each 90 days and whether or not the inventory is gonna go up or down,” he mentioned. “It permits for readability, and readability permits for extra concentrate on executing the plan, versus worrying about what individuals give it some thought.”
Though a personal fairness deal looks as if the good move for Walgreens to some, Wright of Morgan Stanley doesn’t appear to assume the deal will undergo.
“Whereas we acknowledge the context round a possible sale in a difficult pharmacy backdrop, a buyout is more durable to ponder given its already sizable debt burden and paltry money circulate, making the worth creation pathway more durable to decipher,” Wright acknowledged within the analyst be aware.
Andrews added that Sycamore Companions will not be the one occasion in Walgreens and there might very effectively be further potential patrons down the street with competing affords.
“That is actually simply the 1st step, and it’ll be attention-grabbing to see whether or not one other non-public fairness agency steps in,” he mentioned.
Picture: alexsl, Getty Photographs
