Fortis Healthcare Ltd, which is in battle with Khazanah Nasional Bhd to acquire Singapore-based Parkway Holdings Ltd, made a counter offer at SGD 3.80 / share ($2.71) of Parkway Holdings. Fortis, which owns 25.3% in hospital operator Parkway, made a counter offer against Khazanah Nasional Bhd's SGD 3.78 ($2.7) per piece offer.
Fortis, through RHC is making a counter-offer to Khazanah Nasional Bhd's Sgd 1.18 billion (US$835 million) partial takeover offer made on May 27, aiming to buy 313 million shares, each priced at SGD 3.78 ($2.7). Khazanah wants to hike its shareholding to 51.5% up from 24% currently. In March this year, Fortis Healthcare paid US$685 million to acquire TPG's 23.9% stake along with management duties of the hospital chain with presence in China, Malaysia, Brunei and Singapore.
At 1.15 pm, Fortis healthcare shares were trading at Rs 154.4, up by Rs 2.15 or 1.14%. Shares touched a high of Rs 157.35, up by 3.34% and low of Rs 147 in the early trade on the Bombay Stock Exchange.
On July 1st, RHC Healthcare Pte Ltd, a company jointly owned by RHC Holding Private Limited, the holding company of Malvinder Mohan Singh and Shivinder Mohan Singh, and Fortis Healthcare Limited, announced offer price of S$3.80 per share in cash, an aggregate S$3.2 billion
($2.29 bn) general offer.
The offer price represents a premium of 25.8% over the closing price on May 26, 2010, the day prior to the announcement of the partial offer by Khazanah Nasional Berhad through its indirect wholly-owned subsidiary, Integrated Healthcare Holdings Limited.
Last week, GIC Special Investments--the private equity arm of Singapore Government's GIC—has decided to defer its Rs 380-crore investment in Fortis Healthcare.
The board of Fortis had announced fresh fund-raising plans as a prelude to a possible takeover battle for Parkway Holdings on June 9. Under this, Fortis plans to raise an aggregate amount of up to Rs 2,750 crore ($575 million) through issue of fresh securities. The board also approved increasing the borrowing limit to Rs 6,000 crore ($1.3 billion).
According to a Fortis Healthcare statement, the Principals (Singh brothers) believe that greater value for all stakeholders can be extracted from the group by providing a vehicle to access the dynamic growth of the Indian healthcare industry, creating a platform to enter new fast-growing markets in Asia, and leveraging the combined scale to realise significant operational synergies.
Malvinder Mohan Singh, chairman of Parkway and Fortis, said, “We are continuing to build upon our investment in March this year and we see the combined platform as a way to drive long-term value for the shareholders of both Parkway and Fortis. We see great value in the Parkway brand and believe that Fortis and Parkway together will become a world-class global healthcare organsiation.”
Shivinder Mohan Singh, Managing Director Fortis, said, “We see significant benefits in a deeper integration of Fortis and Parkway. Our vision is to manage the healthcare businesses of Fortis and
Parkway as a single organisation, realise synergies between the two and create a premier pan-Asian healthcare delivery system.”
