405 Heron Drive Suite 200
Swedesboro, NJ 08085
Ph 800.331.8272
www.wedgewood.com

Wedgewood Pharmacy Appoints Maria Kraus, CPA, as CFO

6/24/2021

Swedesboro NJ—Wedgewood Pharmacy has appointed Maria Kraus, CPA to the newly created role of chief financial officer of the company. She reports to Marcy Bliss, chief executive officer, who made the announcement.

Kraus is responsible for the company’s Finance function, with a particular focus on new responsibilities that have emerged from the company’s recent change in ownership. These include working with the board of directors, the CEO, ratings agencies, debt syndicates, and other leaders to drive and support growth strategically. She works with the Finance team to ensure that the company’s systems and processes are scalable and able to meet the demands of rapid growth and innovative business opportunities. She has primary responsibility for planning, implementing, managing, and controlling all financial-related activities of the company including direct responsibility for accounting, finance, strategic planning, job costing, deal analysis, licensing, data information, capital planning, cash, and the budget/forecast process.

Marcy A. Bliss, CEO of Wedgewood Pharmacy, noted, “Maria joins us with more than 25 years of financial and operational experience in the pharmaceutical services and technology industries. She has extensive experience working with board of directors, private equity owners, and global teams. She brings the substantial skills and experience we need to help guide our rapid growth.”

Prior to joining Wedgewood Pharmacy, she served in financial leadership roles, most recently as CFO at Accelerated Enrollment Solutions (AES), a unit of PPD, a global patient-recruitment and site network organization providing services to pharmaceutical companies performing clinical trials. In this role, Maria was responsible for driving AES’ financial vision, as well as leading all financial operations, planning and analysis, accounting, commercial budgets, and internal controls. She also served on the financial leadership team of PPD.

Previously, she was executive vice president, Corporate Development and Strategy at Bioclinica, where she was responsible for that company’s strategic growth, including mergers and acquisitions. She was formerly vice president and corporate controller at Bioclinica where she led the Global Accounting and Finance, Legal, Procurement, Facilities, Human Resources, Marketing, and Information Technology Departments. Maria began her career at PricewaterhouseCoopers in Philadelphia.

Maria is a board director of The Hershey Trust Company and a board manager of the Milton Hershey School, where she serves as vice chair, and chairs the Audit Committee. She also is a board manager for the M.S. Hershey Foundation, and serves as chairman. Maria also has been a board member with the Girl Scouts of Eastern Pennsylvania for more than a decade.

Maria earned her B.S. degree in Accounting from Pennsylvania State University and a certificate of Human Resources Management from Villanova University. She is a certified public accountant.

About Wedgewood Pharmacy

Wedgewood Pharmacy is the largest compounding pharmacy devoted to animal-health in the U.S. Compounding is the long-established tradition in pharmacy practice that enables practitioners to prescribe and patients to take medicines that are specially prepared by pharmacists to meet patients' individual needs. A growing number of patients have unique health needs that off-the-shelf prescription medicines cannot meet. For them, customized, compounded medications prescribed or ordered by licensed physicians or veterinarians and mixed safely by trained, licensed compounding pharmacists are the only way to better health.

Compounded medications are created and prepared by specially trained pharmacists and pharmacy technicians in state-regulated pharmacies when mass-manufactured drugs are not, according to a prescriber, available or are not appropriate for a patient. The company’s 503B Outsourcing Facility, Wedgewood Connect, compounds medications under FDA’s modified cGMP standards.

Today’s Wedgewood Pharmacy grew from a local community pharmacy to become one of the largest compounding pharmacies in the United States. It is the leading pharmacy brand in animal health, recognized by 99% of veterinarians, and used by 8 in 10 veterinarians within the past year. It also prepares compounded medications for the human-health medical specialties of addiction medicine, urology and ophthalmology. The company serves more than 50,000 prescribers and hundreds of thousands of patients throughout the U.S. every year.

George (late) and Lucy Malmberg, both pharmacists, purchased Wedgewood Pharmacy in 1981; the year after the pharmacy opened. In June 2016, New Harbor Capital, became the majority shareholder of the company. In 2018, the company acquired Diamondback Drugs. In 2020, the company purchased and began production at Wedgewood Connect, an FDA-registered 503B Outsourcing Facility, in San Jose, California. In the same year, the company acquired Wildlife Pharmaceuticals and ZooPharm, in Colorado and Wyoming, respectively. In early 2021, New Harbor Capital sold its majority interest in the company to leading global private-markets firm, Partners Group, acting on behalf of its clients.

Wedgewood Pharmacy is accredited by the Pharmacy Compounding Accreditation Board (PCAB®) for compliance with PCAB and other nationally recognized compounding standards. PCAB was formed by eight of the nation’s leading pharmacy associations and is a service of Accreditation Commission for Health Care. As a third-party accreditation organization, PCAB has developed the highest national standards against which providers are measured to demonstrate their ability to effectively and efficiently deliver quality compounded medications to consumers.

Wedgewood Pharmacy employs more than 700 people.

About Partners Group

Partners Group is a leading global private-markets firm. Since 1996, the firm has invested more than USD 145 billion in private equity, private real estate, private debt, and private infrastructure on behalf of its clients globally. Partners Group seeks to generate superior returns through capitalizing on thematic growth trends and transforming attractive businesses and assets into market leaders. The firm is a committed, responsible investor and aims to create sustainable returns with lasting, positive impact for all its stakeholders. With more than USD 109 billion in assets under management as of December 31, 2020, Partners Group provides an innovative range of bespoke client solutions to institutional investors, sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and private individuals globally. The firm employs more than 1,500 diverse professionals across 20 offices worldwide and has regional headquarters in Baar-Zug, Switzerland; Denver, USA; and Singapore. It has been listed on the SIX Swiss Exchange since 2006 (symbol: PGHN). For more information, please visit www.partnersgroup.com or follow the company on LinkedIn or Twitter.