Vancouver False Creek private surgery clinic sold to Toronto equity company
2019-08-19 from vancouversun.com
A Toronto private-equity company has bought False Creek Healthcare Centre in Vancouver, one of B.C.’s first private surgery and diagnostic facilities.
In a memo to employees obtained by Postmedia, the owner of the facility and four others in Canada — Centric Health — says the deal is expected to close at the end of September. The buyer is Kensington Capital Advisers.
Doctors and patients can expect a “business as usual” transition followed by an improvement in facilities and quality of care, according to Kirk Hamilton, vice-president of Kensington. The company, which describes itself as an investor in “alternative assets” bought the clinics in Vancouver, Calgary, Winnipeg, Toronto and Mississauga for $35 million. The clinics will be owned by the Kensington Private Equity Fund.
False Creek was opened in the late 1990s by an entrepreneurial Vancouver anesthesiologist, Dr. Mark Godley. In 2011, he sold the Vancouver centre and a sister facility in Winnipeg to Centric Health for $24 million.
The surgical clinics have apparently been a drag on Centric’s financial bottom line. In the memo to employees, David Murphy, the Centric CEO, said the “bittersweet” transaction is the culmination of a year-long review to improve the company’s financial health.
The decision was made “that the most viable path forward was to divest some of our businesses and pursue a more focused strategy built around our seniors’ pharmacy business.”
Murphy nevertheless told employees the growth potential for the private surgery business is “immense” and that Kensington is “the right owner for this business” as it is committed to increasing investment in each of the surgical sites.
“I am confident they will partner with you to help this business realize its tremendous growth potential.”
In B.C., changing government policies initiated by the NDP have been destabilizing the private surgery business. There is the uncertain outcome of the continuing B.C. trial into the constitutionality of paying privately for expedited surgery in such clinics. Closing arguments in the three-year-long trial will not be made before the fall and a judge’s decision is not expected until sometime in 2020.
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