Bausch + Lomb, the company that has its roots in Rochester and still employs more than 1,100 people locally, is likely to go through a corporate change in the next year or so.
Its corporate parent, Bausch Health Companies, will announce Thursday that it intends to spin-off its eye health business into an independent publicly traded entity, Bausch + Lomb – NewCo.
That would split operations like the vision care business, which makes contact lenses in Rochester, into a separate company from the pharmaceutical operations.
The Wall Street Journal, which first reported the news, said that the eye-care unit, Bausch + Lomb, had $3.7 billion in revenue last year, compared with about $4.9 billion from the rest of the company.
This news comes about seven years after the Canadian pharmaceutical company Valeant acquired Bausch + Lomb for nearly $9 billion.
Bausch Health chairman and CEO Joseph Papa said that the company is committed to take action to unlock what they see as unrecognized value in Bausch Health shares, and management believes that separating the company will give each business greater flexibility to pursue strategic opportunities.
A Bausch Health spokesperson tells WXXI News in terms of any local impact, they are still in the very early stages of the process but will provide updates over the coming months.
George Conboy with Brighton Securities said that it’s likely B + L would continue to have operations remaining in Rochester even after the spin-off since they have a high tech facility here, and are well respected in the industry. Conboy said one hope would be to see if the headquarters could be moved back to Rochester. In recent years, that division has had the corporate offices in New Jersey.
