Mills & Reeve Leeds leads legal advice on cross-border medtech deal worth up to £150 million

Mills & Reeve’s Leeds office has led the legal advice on the sale of Oxfordshire-based medical device manufacturer Owen Mumford to Nasdaq-listed embecta Corp. in a deal valued at up to £150 million. The Mills & Reeve Leeds team, headed by corporate partner Alex Kenworthy, advised Owen Mumford’s shareholders throughout the transaction. The deal, announced on 19 March, comprises £100 million in upfront cash at closing plus up to £50 million in performance-based payments linked to sales of Owen Mumford’s next-generation Aidaptus auto-injector platform over three years.

What the Deal Involves

Owen Mumford, founded in 1952, is a privately held manufacturer of drug-delivery devices, point-of-care testing equipment, self-injection systems, and pelvic health products. The company generated net revenue of £69.4 million in its 2025 financial year and works with some of the world’s largest pharmaceutical and biotech organisations. Embecta, headquartered in New Jersey and listed on the Nasdaq, is a global diabetes care technology business with a commercial presence in more than 100 countries. The acquisition is part of embecta’s strategy to transform into a broader medical supplies company.

The transaction drew on Mills & Reeve’s cross-office model, with Alex Kenworthy leading from Leeds. Other advisers on the deal included Forvis Mazars as financial adviser to Owen Mumford and its shareholders, J.P. Morgan Securities as financial adviser to embecta, and A&O Shearman as embecta’s legal counsel.

““Throughout the process we received truly excellent and timely advice and assistance from the Mills & Reeve team. Their experience and support was extremely valuable and we undoubtedly made the right choice in selecting them as our legal advisers for this transaction. They were a pleasure to work with.”

— Adam Mumford, shareholder, Owen Mumford

“It was a real pleasure to work with the shareholders and members of the senior leadership team and to bring together colleagues from our Leeds and Oxford offices on this deal – drawing on the advantages of local presence alongside our national resource and expertise to deliver this complex, cross-border life sciences transaction – it’s something that genuinely sets Mills & Reeve apart.”

— Alex Kenworthy, Partner, Mills & Reeve (Leeds)

Growing Legal Firepower at 1 City Square

The deal underlines the growing capacity of Mills & Reeve’s Leeds operation. The firm opened its Leeds office in 2008 and has expanded significantly in recent years, moving into 10,200 sq ft at 1 City Square and increasing headcount by 25% in the past year. The Leeds office was named Large Firm of the Year at the Yorkshire Legal Awards in 2024.

Why this matters for Leeds

A £150 million cross-border medtech acquisition, advised on by a Nasdaq-listed buyer’s counterpart and involving J.P. Morgan and A&O Shearman on the other side. The fact that Mills & Reeve led from its Leeds office at 1 City Square reinforces a pattern: the city’s professional services firms are increasingly winning and leading complex, high-value transactional work.