Hyderabad-based Quality Care India Ltd, which runs a multi-specialty hospital chain under CARE Hospitals brands, has raised an undisclosed amount in fresh funding from private equity firm Advent International to part-finance acquisition of a hospital in Hyderabad, a top company executive told VCCircle.
The firm will use internal accruals, debt funding from a bank besides the money raised from global PE giant Advent, which already owns a majority stake in CARE Hospitals, to acquire a newly built hospital with 250 beds in HITEC City in Hyderabad.
Dilip Jose, group CEO of CARE Hospitals, declined to give a break-up of the funding amount but said the firm would be investing Rs 200 crore to buy and spruce up the centre.
“We have acquired this asset from a US-based investor and the property was under construction and got completed a few months ago. The building was suitable for setting up a hospital in terms of structure and location—it fit our plan and we acquired it.”
He added that the unit will be ready by December.
The new hospital would focus on oncology as well as organ transplants and will be renamed CARE HITEC City.
This follows CARE’s recent addition of a 100-bed facility in Visakhapatnam and together, the two transactions will help consolidate the group’s presence in Telangana and Andhra Pradesh.
“We are now in a position to provide a broad range of tertiary care services across a larger platform,” said B Soma Raju, founder and chairman of CARE Hospitals.
Group CEO Jose, said, “The new hospital enhances our leadership position in Hyderabad and is in line with the cluster strategy that we have adopted across our network to ensure scale and leadership in our geographies, enabling an extended range of clinical services and ease of access for our patients.”
CARE has been growing rapidly over the past few years. It grew its footprint from 12 hospitals and 1,600 beds in seven cities three years ago to 17 hospitals and 2,400 beds in nine cities today. It is also in advanced stages of setting up a green-field hospital in Bhubaneswar, which, coupled with ongoing expansions at existing facilities in Raipur and Pune, will add 600 more beds, taking the total number of beds in CARE’s system to over 3,000 by year end.
Advent International had invested around $105 million in the company in 2012. The bulk of the money went to provide an exit to previous investors in the company—
Rakesh Jhunjhunwala, Matrix Laboratories’ founder Nimmagadda Prasad and UK-based emerging markets fund Ashmore.
(Edited by Joby Puthuparampil Johnson)
