Bribery

Inquiry Into Foreign Bribes at Biomet Hangs Over $13 Billion Merger

By BEN PROTESS and MICHAEL J. DE LA MERCED

 DECEMBER 23, 2014 11:09 AM December 23, 2014 11:09 am 43 Comments

Photo

Part of the Zimmer campus in Warsaw, Ind. CreditTaylor Glascock for The New York Times

From the skyscrapers of Wall Street to the factories of northern Indiana, cheers rang out for one of the biggest mergers of the year. For $13.35 billion, Goldman Sachs and a group of giant private equity firms agreed in April to sell one Indiana medical device maker to another.

But possible acts of bribery abroad may have complicated that deal — and raised larger questions about the way prosecutors mete out justice for big corporations, according to confidential documents reviewed by The New York Times and interviews with lawyers briefed on the matter.

Biomet, the medical devices company being sold to its rival Zimmer Holdings, is suspected of helping to bribe government officials in Mexico and Brazil, according to the confidential documents, which have not been previously reported. An email from an anonymous whistle-blower laid bare the problems in Brazil, reporting that distributors Biomet had hired to sell its orthopedic devices were “paying kickbacks” to government doctors.

The fate of Biomet’s merger now hinges partly on the outcome of bribery investigations by the Justice Department and the Securities and Exchange Commission, painful reminders of a separate 2012 federal case that accused Biomet of foreign bribery. Although Biomet disclosed the thrust of its problems to Zimmer before striking the deal — and neither company has shown signs of abandoning it — an unexpectedly steep penalty for Biomet could alter the price of the deal…

Read more at: http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2014/12/23/inquiry-into-foreign-bribes-at-biomet-hangs-over-13-billion-merger/