So who is buying what in Africa?
Recent weeks have seen renewed interest in old mature markets. Companies like Life Healthcare of South Africa and Australian player Ramsay Healthcare have bought in Europe. So who is buying in Africa and what assets have they picked up?
The big buyer has been Abraaj Capital, the Dubai private equity house, which sold its stake in Acibadem, the upmarket Turkish chain to IHH in 2013. So what has it bought?
In total, it has now made six investments.
Together with Swedfund, the Swedish state VC fund it has invested US$6.5m in The Nairobi Women’s Hospital. In Ghana it has picked up a stake in Aniniwah Medical Centre with 200 inpatient beds and an outpatient centre for 500. The money will be used to upgrade diagnostics.
In Kenya it has bought into Avenue, which operates a 70-bed hospital, and runs a network of eight outpatient clinics and four in-house clinics, as well as home-based nursing care.
In Togo it has bought in to Biasa Clinic, with 40 staff and a range of services including gynecology, pediatrics, neurology, echography and diagnostic services. Bed numbers will be grown from 24 to 80.
In Ghana it has invested in C&J Medicare with three walk-in clinics for the general public as well as onsite clinics for companies such as Coca-Cola. C&J also has a pharma distribution arm.
In Nigeria it has acquired The Bridge Clinic which provides reproduction services working with a team from King’s College Hospital, UK. It has also bought PathCare, a Nigerian diagnostic lab group.
Other than Abraaj, the other big investor is Espiritu Santo Saude which together with a Portuguese multinational construction company is in the process of constructing a hospital in Angola.
What is striking, of course, is how small Abraaj’s investments are. They look more like venture capital than private equity. It emphasises the hige difference between Africa and investing in mature businesses with sales of €10m or €100m in Europe.
