Asia Healthcare Holdings, a single-speciality healthcare investment platform of private equity firm TPG Growth, said it will acquire clinics chain Nova IVI Fertility Pvt. Ltd.
It didn't disclose the deal value. However, VCCircle reported six months ago that Asia Healthcare had sealed the deal to buy Nova IVI Fertility for Rs 500-550 crore ($68-75 million according to the exchange rate then).
Asia Healthcare was set up in 2017 by TPG Growth, the growth capital arm of US private equity firm TPG Global.
The healthcare platform's two other investments are Rhea Healthcare Pvt. Ltd and American Oncology Institute. Rhea runs a hospital chain under the Motherhood brand. TPG had picked up a 65% stake in American Oncology Institute for $33 million in April 2016 and had invested $33 million in Rhea for a significant majority stake in July the same year. These two investments subsequently came under the healthcare platform.
Nova IVI Fertility
The company, which was started in 2011, operates 20 in-vitro fertilisation (IVF) centres across 15 cities.
In 2009, the firm first attracted funding from a player called GTI Capital. So far, GTI has put around Rs 33 crore in total in Nova, according to VCCEdge, the data and research platform of Mosaic Digital.
New Enterprise Associates (NEA) had come in as an investor in 2010, leading a funding round of $10 million. Two years later, Nova raised a large funding round of around $60 million led by Goldman Sachs. In 2014, Nova raised another $10.75 million from Goldman and NEA. In 2017, Goldman and NEA jointly pumped in $9.79 million.
The IVF market in India is highly fragmented with both domestic firms and a handful of foreign companies offering their services. Besides Nova, there is Bourn Hall India, part of the UK-based healthcare services firm Bourn Hall International. Bourn Hall India is backed by private equity firm TVM Capital MENA.
Besides IVF firms, Indian healthcare providers such as Cloudnine Hospitals, which is mainly focused on birthing, and Rainbow Hospitals, which mainly provides paediatric services, also offer IVF services. Large hospital chains including Apollo Hospitals and Max Healthcare, too, offer IVF services.
In another deal in the space, in April 2019, US-based private equity firm TA Associates acquired a significant minority stake in Indira IVF Hospital Pvt. Ltd.
