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Interview: Attila Vegh, CEO, Penta Hospitals Group

By 2025 Penta Hospitals Group (PHG) owned by private equity house Penta Investments, plans to more than triple sales to over €1bn. But growth could be even faster, says its new CEO, Attila Vegh, a former boss of three large English NHS hospital trusts. The real ambition of the group, a merger of Svet Zdravia in Slovakia, the Polish chain EMC and Penta’s hospitals in Czech Republic, is even greater than the sales forecasts suggest. Much of the growth he says will come from working with the public sector. Vegh says that Penta wants to be “a disrupter, a company which introduces best practice and innovation,” thus persuading public payors to rethink their attitude to the private sector. So how do you do that in a region which is becoming increasingly statist and hostile to international capitalism?

FREE BLOG A brave move

It is not often you come across private equity prepared to put serious money into building hospitals where 99% of the patients will be paid for by a public payor. The risks are high. So why is Penta Investments preparing to build a Pan-East European hospital chain with projected sales of at least €1bn by 2025?

Life deal still some way off

Life Healthcare of South Africa is looking for acquisitions in attractive markets, but a deal is still some way off, says head of investor relations, Adam Pyle. Eastern Europe could offer synergies with Life’s Polish operation, he says, but so could South Asia or another Indian acquisition with Max Healthcare, Life's existing Indian venture.

Prices tumble for genetic tests

The price of some popular genetic tests have all but halved in little more than a year.  B2C web sites are now springing up offering ever lower prices as Chinese operators enter the European market. So what does this mean for diagnostic lab groups who have for so long prophesied that complex genetic testing will […]

Interview: Eduard Maták, partner at Penta Investments

Statist governments were recently elected in both Poland and Slovakia, completing the picture of market scepticism in Visegrad. Predictably, the future of the private healthcare sector is under question. That’s bad news for the Central European investment group, Penta, which favours healthcare services and insurance. Healthcare Europa discussed the changing political landscape and Penta’s future plans with partner, Eduard Maták.

Svet Zdravia bets on more privatisations in Czechia

Although the current Czech government is not keen on hospital privatisations, Penta-owned Slovak chain Svet Zdravia, with €160m revenues and 14 hospitals, expects the mood to change after the 2016 elections. But Central Europe remains marked by strong government interference and the misuse of public funds.

Emirates Hospital buys 60% of Slovakian rehab specialist Adeli

Dubai-based Emirates hospital is to buy 60% of children neuro-rehabilitation Slovakian specialist Adeli. Pramod Balakrishnan, CEO of Emirates Hospital, says the group plans to open five centres in the UAE, Kuwait and Qatar to provide follow-up care to patients returning from Slovakia.

Report: Reforming healthcare – trends and trajectories

European countries are undergoing rapid and substantial demographic and technological changes. Yet, healthcare systems are still mainly state-funded and acute-focused, as they have been for the past 70 years. This is starting to change.

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