Warburg Pincus has hired Goldman Sachs to explore a sale of eye care company Bausch & Lomb Inc, a deal thast may fetch the private equity firm more than $10 billion, Bloomberg today reported, citing two people familiar with the matter.

The New York-based private equity firm with $30 billion in assets under management, is seeking around $10 billion from the sale, but the asset may only fetch as much as $8 billion, said the report. Warburg Pincus had taken Bausch & Lomb private in 2007 for $3.7 billion.

The report said that Goldman Sachs has already approached health-care companies such as French drug giant Sanofi, UK-based GlaxoSmithKline and US-based Merck & Co, while it is yet to contact Abbott Laboratories.

Bausch & Lomb competes with Johnson & Johnson, Alcon, Allergan, MSD-Chibret and Ciba Vision, a unit of Novartis.

Warburg Pincus could also turn to an initial public offering as an alternative if a buyer cannot be found, the report added.

Founded in 1853 by two German immigrants, John Jacob Bausch, a trained optician and Henry Lomb, who put in the finance, Bausch & Lomb is one of the world's leading suppliers of eye health products, such as contact lenses and lens care products.

The Rochester, New York-based company is also one of the oldest continually operating companies in the US.

Earlier, it also produced photographic lenses, spectacle lenses, microtomes, binoculars and telescopes,optical lenses, eyeglasses,, microscopes, binoculars, projectors, camera lenses, camera diaphragms, and also produced the lenses for cameras which captured the first satellite images of the Moon.

Its biggest blunder was selling the popular Ray-Ban brand of sunglasses in 1999 to Italy's Luxottica Group.

In 2007, eye products maker Advanced Medical Optics (AMO) had made a $75 per share or $4.3 billion bid for Busch & Lomb, but had to withdraw after opposition from its largest shareholder, ValueAct Capital, which held 14.7 per cent stake in AMO. (See: AMO drops its bid for Bausch & Lomb)

After going private, the company did not disclose revenues, but reported net profit of $410 million in 2007 on sales of $2.51 billion.

In March 2010, Warburg Pincus hired Fred Hassan, former chairman and CEO of Schering-Plough, as the new chairman of Bausch & Lomb, and Brent Saunders, former president of Global Consumer Health at Schering-Plough, as the new CEO.

Hassan is known for deal making in the health-care industry. He was the prime mover in the 2000 acquisition of Monsanto Co by Pharmacia & Upjohn for $37 billion, and three years later sold Pharmacia to drug giant Pfizer for $58 billion.

He was also heading Schering-Plough when it was sold to Merck for $41 billion in 2009.

Since joining Bausch & Lomb, Hassan has expaned the company through acquisitions. The latest deal was done last month, when Bausch & Lomb  acquired Germany's eye laser firm Technolas Perfect Vision GmbH.