Nutrition21 acquired as part of new investment platform

Top-shelf branded ingredient supplier Nutrition21 was acquired by a private equity firm intent on building an attractive ingredients holding company.

Everwell Health Holdings is a new consumer health and wellness functional ingredients platform. Its mission is to actively pursue partnerships and business development opportunities with additional functional ingredient companies, and will focus on amplifying investments in clinical studies, new product development, marketing and sales.

Nutrition21, led by president Joe Weiss, is a developer and marketer of high-value, clinically substantiated ingredients for use in dietary supplements, foods and beverages. Its ingredient portfolio includes the brands Nitrosigine, Velositol, Chromax, Lustriva, and nooLVL. The latter ingredient was judged to be the energy category winner in the Ingredient Idol competition at the recent SupplySide West show.

Everwell is reminiscent of Nutranext, a similar platform only on the finished products side, which acquired in rapid succession market leaders NeoCell, Rainbow Light and Natural Vitality before bunding the group and selling it to CPG giant Clorox in 2018 for $700 million.

That was a savvy strategy because the individual supplement companies on their own were not likely to attract the attention of such a large finished-products company like Clorox. In other words, the sum was larger than its parts.

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“Our new ingredients platform, anchored by an industry leader in Nutrition21, builds upon our experience in consumer healthcare,” said Pierre Frechette, RoundTable Managing Partner and Chairman of the Board of Everwell Health. “As consumers demand more from their products, we believe scientifically backed, high-quality functional ingredients are poised for strong growth to meet this need.”

RoundTable also announced the appointment of Steve Rosenman to the position of Chief Executive Officer of Everwell Health. In this role, Rosenman will focus on expanding the Everwell platform through organic initiatives and strategic business development. He brings more than 20 years of experience in consumer health and wellness and has held senior leadership positions in sales, marketing, product innovation, and strategic planning, most recently with International Vitamin Corporation.

“I am excited to join Everwell and partner with Nutrition21 to build this new platform,” said Rosenman. “RoundTable's unique operating expertise and core values, centered around reputation and trust, are the right fit to raise the bar in the functional ingredients market and add value to our partners. With a long and rich history of combining ingredient innovation with strong clinical studies and IP, Nutrition21 provides a strong foundation for future growth.”

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“I look forward to partnering with Steve and the RoundTable team to accelerate Nutrition21's growth and help Everwell become a leading platform across the entire functional ingredients market,” added Weiss.

Everwell Health represents the fifth equity investment from RoundTable's $700 million Equity Fund V and seventh platform investment in the consumer healthcare market in the last nine years. In addition to RoundTable's equity, senior debt financing was provided by Capital One, National Association and included CIBC Bank USA. Senior subordinated notes were provided by RoundTable Capital Partners III, RoundTable's captive subordinated debt fund. Sidley Austin LLP acted as legal advisor to RoundTable in this transaction. William Hood & Company served as exclusive financial advisor to Nutrition21 for the transaction.