HedgeCo.Net — Growth-focused private equity firm Trilantic North America has agreed to sell SOFIE Biosciences, a U.S. contract manufacturer of PET radiopharmaceuticals, to GE HealthCare for $945 million in cash, the companies announced on October 5, 2026. The transaction is expected to close in the first half of 2027, subject to regulatory approvals, after which SOFIE will become part of GE HealthCare’s pharmaceutical diagnostics segment.
SOFIE operates a U.S. network of 15 contract manufacturing sites running 21 cyclotrons, plus a theranostics-focused development and manufacturing site. That footprint addresses the “final mile” of PET imaging supply: fluorine-18 based tracers have a short half-life and must be produced close to the hospitals and imaging centers that use them, which makes a distributed manufacturing network difficult and expensive to replicate.
The deal also brings GE HealthCare U.S. rights to FAPI-74, an experimental PET imaging agent in late-stage trials that could be used to detect several types of cancer; GE HealthCare already holds rights outside the U.S. SOFIE will continue to manufacture products for its existing customers, including other radiopharmaceutical companies, after closing. Kirkland & Ellis advised Trilantic-backed SOFIE on the sale.
For private equity, the transaction is a clean strategic exit in a sector that has drawn sustained sponsor interest. Radiopharmaceuticals combine specialized infrastructure, regulatory barriers and growing clinical demand as more imaging agents and targeted radiotherapies move through development, characteristics that let a sponsor build a platform that a large strategic buyer cannot easily construct itself. A cash sale to a public medtech company also delivers certainty of proceeds at a time when many sponsors are relying on continuation vehicles and partial sales to return capital.
The broader takeaway for healthcare investors is that manufacturing and supply-chain assets, not just drug pipelines, are commanding strategic premiums. As GE HealthCare and its peers seek control over production capacity for short-lived isotopes, sponsor-owned contract manufacturers and specialty logistics providers in the space are likely to remain attractive targets, and sponsors with similar assets will be watching how this sale is valued.