The CRO Pharmaceutical Product Development (PPD) will be acquired by the Carlyle Group and Hellman and Friedman in a deal valued at approximately $3.9 billion. PPD shareholders will receive $33.25 per share in cash, and PPD will become a privately held company after completion of the transaction. PPD employs more than 11,000 people worldwide and provides contract preclinical and clinical development services to the pharmaceutical and biotechnology sectors.

The Carlyle Group is a global alternative asset manager, and Hellman and Friedman is a private equity firm. Funding for the deal will come from the two companies, along with external debt financing commitments provided by Credit Suisse, JP Morgan, Goldman Sachs, and UBS. The transaction is expected to close in the fourth quarter of 2011.

“Fred Eshelman and PPD’s management team have built a leading and extremely high-quality global research and services organization that will continue to help pharmaceutical and biotech companies develop new drugs at lower costs,” said Karen H. Bechtel, managing director and head of the healthcare group at Carlyle, in a press release. “We look forward to helping expand and enhance PPD’s platform and broad spectrum of therapeutic expertise.”