Local listed groups keen to kick Qscan’s tyres

The on-again-off-again sales process for Quadrant Private Equity’s Qscan business is believed hotting up once more, and this time, local listed groups are said to be among the parties taking a look.

It is thought soft soundings are still being undertaken before a process starts in September.

Expected to be eyeing the business are the listed Ramsay Health Care and Healius, along with I-Med, owned by private equity firm Permira.

However, while buyers are thought to exist for the business, which operates in the highly attractive healthcare sector, the big question will be at what price, with some suspecting that the operation could be offloaded for less than 10 times its earnings in the current COVID-19-impacted environment.

Still, few expected Healius would achieve a strong outcome for the sale of its medical centre division at a time when global acquirers were less keen due to global travel restrictions, and local buyout fund BGH Capital surprised the market by outlaying $500m for that business last month — more than many had expected.

The price represented a little over 13 times the medical centres’ 2019 earnings of $37.5m.

Private equity firms focused on core plus infrastructure investments could also be in the mix for Qscan, with EQT Infrastructure circling the Australasian market in the past year, earlier bidding $NZ1.5bn for New Zealand’s Metlifecare before backing out of the deal due to COVID-19.

The Wall Street Journal reported this week that the European group would target €12.5bn for its fifth infrastructure fund in what would be the firm’s largest such vehicle to date.

Stanton Road Partners and Citic-CLSA are working for Qscan.

It has been operating 33 clinics with 40 radiologists.