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Matrix Partners India has invested Rs 40 crore in the Kerala-based Meditrina Hospitals for a significant minority stake. This is the first round of institutional equity funding in Meditrina, which provides cardiac care with its centres housed in other hospitals.
Founded by N. Prathap Kumar, an interventional cardiologist, Meditrina now operates four units focussing on interventional cardiology in south and central Kerala. With this funding, Meditrina plans to open a centre each within six months in Hyderabad and Bhubaneswar and a centre of excellence in Kollam.
Meditrina’s centres are now in Thiruvananthapuram, Changanacherry, Thodupuzha and Kollam. Meditrina does not set up separate cardiac care hospitals, as the investment required will be high. Instead, it takes up space in existing hospitals that do not have facilities for cardiac care and puts up these centres – what is called a Specialty in Hospital (SIH).
This way, says Prathap Kumar, the capital investment is much lower and the main hospital also gets a cardiac care facility. These centres will have two cardiologists and four medical officers, and about 20 beds in all, including 8-10 in intensive care. The investment in these centres will be Rs 6-8 crore. The centres will handle on an average 30 angiograms and 100 angioplasties a month. Meditrina, which uses the main hospital’s infrastructure, shares a percentage of its revenues with the hospital in which its centres are located.
Grant Thornton India advised Meditrina on the deal.
According to Asish Mohapatra, Vice-President, Matrix India, the plan is to have seven Meditrina SIHs in the next one year – mainly in the South and East, including one in Siliguri.
Matrix Partners India has four earlier investments in the healthcare sector — eye care, maternity and infant care, orthopaedics and cosmetology. It has about Rs 3,000 crore under management and it invests in companies targeting the consumer market at the seed, early and growth stages with initial investments going up to Rs 75 crore.
> ramakrishnan.n@thehindu.co.in
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