Investment

Sahyadri Hospitals to get $36m from ICICI Venture

The hospital announces plans to proliferate world-class specialty, secondary and tertiary medical care across Maharashtra

Dr Charudutt Apte

ICICI Venture recently announced an investment of $36 million through its holding company IVEN Medicare in Sahyadri Hospitals Limited (SHL) promoted by renowned neurosurgeon Dr Charudutt Apte for an undisclosed stake. The investment, accomplished in two phases of 18 months each will be used to build a network of tertiary care hospitals, secondary care hospitals, centers of excellence, specialty spokes, and boutique hospitals across Maharashtra. Over the next one to two years, SHL would have a network of around 20 hospitals/centers across Maharashtra.

Dr Charudutt Apte, Chairman, Sahyadri Hospitals Limited, said: "At SHL, we have always believed in and strived to live by our '3A' principle. It means we have endeavoured to make specialty healthcare Available, Accessible and Affordable. Thus, we have been committed to serve patients from all strata of society. Our expansion plans are to further this mission of ours. We realised that even in tier two and tier three towns which serve as nuclei to hundreds of satellite villages and hamlets, specialty medical aid is unheard of. We want to take world class medical aid there. We also realised that not only local doctor/s, but there are several others like, reputed localities and local business groups, businessmen, industrialists, wealthy citizens, social groups and organisations would love to help in / invest to open good hospitals but do not know whom to approach. SHL will attempt to work with such people to truly integrate itself into the interiors of Maharashtra."

The Group believes in 'complimenting and not competing' with the existing medical infrastructure of cities, towns or villages. "If a particular town has an excellent orthopaedic hospital, we will not go and build another to compete, rather we will partner with the management of that hospital to start may be a state-of-the-art pediatrics or heart hospital so that particular town or district gets one more latest and fast medical aid."
Alluri Srinivas Rao, Director, Investments, ICICI Ventures, said: "SHL's efficient business model and growth plan attracted IVEN Medicare to invest in them. An IVEN Medicare senior team will work closely with SHL's management team to achieve their robust growth plan. ICICI Venture sees itself as a 'catalyst' and it is our endeavour to partner with people / organisations who have a strong, clear vision blueprint to bring about concrete, positive change in society.

EH News Bureau