Merck claims that they are going to keep a significant presence in St. Louis, but we all know how that goes. Does anyone with any insight in the industry, know what 'synergies' with be realized with this deal. They employ 1800 here now. I wonder what that number looks like in a few years. How much overlap in biz does Sigma and Merck have? Anyone?

Viasystems in Clayton acquired today also....

St. Louis firms always being acquired and seem to rarely do the acquiring. I wouldn't think this is due to the city, but the businesses themselves. Is this just bad luck, or is there something about St. Louis that makes its businesses targets rather being the ones doing the targeting?

mattonarsenal wrote:St. Louis firms always being acquired and seem to rarely do the acquiring. I wouldn't think this is due to the city, but the businesses themselves. Is this just bad luck, or is there something about St. Louis that makes its businesses targets rather being the ones doing the targeting?

St Louis firms do a ton of acquiring. Businesses come, businesses go. All part of life.

downtown2007 wrote:

mattonarsenal wrote:St. Louis firms always being acquired and seem to rarely do the acquiring. I wouldn't think this is due to the city, but the businesses themselves. Is this just bad luck, or is there something about St. Louis that makes its businesses targets rather being the ones doing the targeting?

St Louis firms do a ton of acquiring. Businesses come, businesses go. All part of life.

And how many of the large companies in the area now were small ones 20 years ago or not even existed then. Isn't one thing too that isn't mentioned at times with largest companies is a number of the ones here are privately held so they don't show up on listings.

Also, from what I am seeing with the two companies involved, it seems there isn't too much overlap in terms of what they do and specialize in. Also it is possible they could move some of the Mass. staff here if its similar to what is done here as a way to cut costs due to cost of living differences.

Hasn't there been a few acquisitions of local companies here that wound up having the acquiring company add workers here or move some of their operations here due to various factors? I'm thinking one or two financial companies did that among others.

The problem isn't that STL companies get bought out or leave, but more that we don't have a robust entrepreneurial economy that churns out new companies like some other Metros. This would lessen the blow of companies getting bought out or leaving.

downtown2007 wrote:we don't have a robust entrepreneurial economy that churns out new companies like some other Metros

You think so? What about Express Scripts, Reinsurance Group of America, Centene, Belden, Enterprise Financial, Perficient, FutureFuel, World Point Terminals... 25 years ago these companies barely existed, if at all. Now they're Trading for hundreds of millions and billions of dollars.

Many are spun off from other, older companies: American General -> RGA; Emerson -> Belden; Ralcorp -> Post; Apax Oil -> World Point & FutureFuel; Peabody Energy -> Patriot Coal; and we're about to get another when Energizer splits into two companies. Solutia (which was bought by Eastman) was spun-off from Monsanto. Mallinckrodt has strangely gone from independent to subsidiary and back in the last 25 years. The A-B purchase, obviously completely devastating, has led to a rash of entrepreneurial brewery activity (UCBC, Civil Life, BrewHub among others).

Also, in some instances, there's an argument that the acquisitions were a net positive: namely Nestle buying Ralston-Purina, Boeing buying McDonnell-Douglas, maybe CenturyLink buying Savvis. Those might be a stretch though. While it's painful to see these go, I think St. Louis' corporate landscape does consistently evolve and churn out new companies.

My Brother-in-Law has worked for Sigma for 18 years, he leads one of their product facilities here. I thought I'd share a couple tidbits from him:

- This was totally unexpected. The feeling internally was that they (Sigma) were the ones in acquisition mode. They actually made a 13B play for another life technologies company last year but were outbid.
- The employees are nervous as anyone would be, but the 2 CEOs released a video to them about the acquisition and their commitment to St. Louis and are having global town hall meeting with the entire corporation today to address concerns.
- Additionally Merck and Sigma CEOs and supporting casts are in St Louis and are actually doing a tour of his facility today.
- He thinks it is very classy that Merck's higher ups are in St Louis and is optimistic this is an early sign of their commitment here.

My take:
- It hurts the pride to lose another legacy corporate headquarters, but Sigma's work is so specialized I do not believe there will be many if any cuts here. If anything I see it as an opportunity for growth. Regional leaders need to jump on this.
- This is the way of a public company in solid economic times. Either buy or be bought.
- There is a good article about this in the Post today. I think Nicklaus's perspective is spot on.

http://www.stltoday.com/business/column ... 36467.html

I think the problem we'll face here, is the lack of a major airport. Will Merck's German reps, want to connect out of Chicago or NYC, to get here?? INBEV reps seem to have a major issue with our airport. According to an ABI employee that I know well, the lack of a major airport and the negative perception of living in St. Louis, prevented STL from being a much bigger part of the global picture for ABI. Who knows how accurate that is, but that is what I was told. I hope that Merck sees potential in St. Louis and grows it's operation here.

DogtownBnR wrote:I think the problem we'll face here, is the lack of a major airport. Will Merck's German reps, want to connect out of Chicago or NYC, to get here?? INBEV reps seem to have a major issue with our airport. According to an ABI employee that I know well, the lack of a major airport and the negative perception of living in St. Louis, prevented STL from being a much bigger part of the global picture for ABI. Who knows how accurate that is, but that is what I was told. I hope that Merck sees potential in St. Louis and grows it's operation here.

I've heard of this with a number of companies, but from what I have heard the airport director say is that they haven't had much luck from the business community in the area in helping out in terms of the airport issue. Basically they complain but don't seem to do much to help fix it, though it sounds like some of the newer business people (often from out of the area) in places like Cortex seem more willing to help.

Also how much will the effects of Ferguson play into this? Since I wonder if that has any pull one way or the other in the business community locally, nationally, and internationally in terms of reputation. It could long-term be a plus if the correct choices are made in addressing the long-standing issues locally and a commitment to improving the region as a whole by spurring a change in both direction and new leadership.

Great news.  Maybe they can build something on that huge lawn they've got on Olive.

Or that huge lawn across from Lemp 

I guess this Is this the Biotech news teased along with the large manufacturer?

^ i thought the big biotech news involved a Bay Area company. MilliporeSigma is MA-based.

GoHarvOrGoHome wrote: ↑

May 21, 2021

Or that huge lawn across from Lemp 

For more manufacturing, eh. I don't think potential residents in lofts at Lemp would appreciate having a factory right across the street from them. But I'd be ok with it.

^I bet if you're okay living in a large historic factory across the street from a modest modern factory you wouldn't mind being across the street from a larger and healthier one, just so long as it didn't get too noisy or stinky. And Sigma seems pretty darn clean as they go.