Last chapter for Air Products, but not Landauer

LEHIGH VALLEY, Pa., and MOUNT VERNON, N.Y. - Air Products Healthcare is no longer in the HME business in the United States.

Landauer Metropolitan Inc. (LMI) announced this week that it bought Air Products' three remaining operations: American Homecare Supply in New York; Denmark's in Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Rhode Island; and Vanguard Home Medical Equipment in Rhode Island.

“It's the last chapter for Air Products, but not for us,” said Joe Luceri, LMI's CFO.

LMI has bought Air Products operations on two other occasions: Earlier this year, it bought Genox Homecare in Connecticut, Mid-Atlantic Healthcare in Maryland and Young's Medical Equipment in Pennsylvania; in 2008, it bought A&J Care in New York and COPD Services in New Jersey.

With this latest acquisition, LMI picks up seven locations. It plans to keep the operations intact, but it may expand their product lines to better reflect its overall offering, Luceri said.

“There's strong management in place at the locations, so we plan to focus on their organic growth,” he said. “When you have businesses that have been for sale as long as these, they kind of start to lose their edge.“

LMI now has 28 locations, about 1,000 employees and $150 million in revenues, Luceri said.

“In the past year, we've probably doubled in size and doubled our number of branches,” he said. “We've stuck to our strategy of staying in the Boston to Washington, D.C., corridor, and we're pleased with the way that's working out. We're hopeful for our future prospects.”

Those future prospects include additional “tuck-in acquisitions,” Luceri said.

“We have locations in Maryland, Washington, D.C., and Virginia, for example, but nothing in Delaware,” he said. “So we may look to establish ourselves in that area.”