UPS Healthcare Logistics buys Hungary-based CEMELOG Zrt

Continuing the build-or-buy expansion program that UPS Healthcare Logistics has been on for several years, the company has acquired CEMELOG, based near Budapest, for an undisclosed price. The transaction is expected to close this quarter. The company, founded in 1999, has three facilities and distributes to hospitals, pharmacies and wholesalers in Central and Eastern Europe.

Although the acquisition is taking place after the failed bid by UPS to obtain regulatory clearance to acquire TNT Express, an international express-delivery company, late last year, the CEMELOG purchase is not a reaction to that bid. Bill Hook, president of UPS Healthcare Logistics, says that the discussions were already under way in mid-2012. “If anything, the TNT outcome just means that we can do these tuck-in acquisitions more quickly,” he says.

In part, the acquisition mirrors that of Pieffe, an Italian regional healthcare distributor UPS acquired in 2011. “That integration has proceeded very smoothly,” say Hook, “and in some ways, it shows us that we can move even faster with these regional integrations into our network.”

UPS now has 41 facilities worldwide (not including CEMELOG), representing over 6.4 million sq. ft of dedicated healthcare space. Hook says that as the network expands globally, it provides a more effective “platform” for companies to develop new models of distribution and multi-channel services to healthcare systems worldwide.