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Ten months ago, Eye-Q – a network of super-speciality eye-care hospitals – had received financial support from SONG, a socially-relevant private equity fund supported by Mr George Soros, the Omidyar Group (a philanthropic investment firm established by e-bay's founder) and Google.
With 11 hospitals dedicated to eye-care established in Northern India, three-year-old Eye-Q is ready for its next round of funding to expand further into tier II and tier III cities in Maharashtra and Gujarat, says co-founder and Chief Executive, Mr Rajat Goel.
The network plans to invest between $20 million and $30 million in this expansion, half of which will be through PE funds, Mr Goel told Business Line .
Specialisation mantra
Specialisation is the mantra and PEs are keen on putting their funds into such super-speciality networks as they show growth potential and pay back fast, he observed.
Healthcare is seen as being recession-proof and technology is changing the way healthcare is delivered. This too is increasing the acceptability (and fuelling the growth) of highly specialised healthcare networks among customers using technology in various aspects of their lives, says Mr S. Krishnamurthy, Chief Executive of 16-year old Beams Hospitals Pvt Ltd, a network of minimally-invasive surgery centres.
The Ambit Group's Ambit Pragma picked up majority stake in Beams in March 2010, though details are not disclosed. With five centres in Mumbai, Amritsar, Indore, Hyderabad and Bangalore, the network is scouting for its next round of funding for expansion into five more centres – Chennai, Pune, Ahmedabad, Delhi and Kolkata – to give it a pan-India presence, he said.
“We are in talks and an additional investor will be brought in,” he confirmed. Further fuelling the growth of specialised networks is the fact that they offer standardised, quality care at centres in your neighbourhood and that brings in more people, he added.
In December last year, Thyrocare promoter Dr A. Velumani formalised a deal to off-load 30 per cent equity in Thyrocare Technologies to private equity Cx Partners for an estimated Rs 188 crore.
The plan was to fork out from thyroid-specific diagnostic network to look at oncology as well.
In fact, say industry representatives, with several diabetes, oncology, wellness and lifestyle-specific networks coming up across the country, PEs will have several specialised projects to park their funds.
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