IK divests GHD to Nordic Capital

Harriet Bailey
19 June 2014

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Nordic Capital has completed the buyout of GHD GesundHeits GmbH Deutschland from previous owner IK Investment Partners.

Nordic Capital used funds from its eighth vehicle to complete the deal.

It is understood GHD has an enterprise value of more than €500m, with IK said to be reaping a 2x money return from its three-year ownership of the company.

During the period of IK's ownership, GHD's sales have almost doubled from €284m in 2010 to €485m in 2013 following a double-digit number of acquisitions and cooperation agreements in the oncology department. GHD's core homecare business now represents approximately 75% of sales, while the company has also become the exclusive distributor of nutrition products from suppliers including Nestlé and Abbott. The company has also developed 13 production facilities across Germany.

Nordic Capital will continue the company's growth strategy, increasing production capacity and supporting further acquisitions.

According to unquote" data, Nordic Capital has previous experience in the healthcare sector, having held Swedish medical devices company Atos Medical for six years until 2011, and last year divesting its stake in wheelchair producer Permobil after an eight-year holding period, reaping 5x money.

The sale of GHD is IK's second divestment this month after announcing the sale of Minimax Viking to Danish investment firm Kirkbi and Intermediate Capital Group in a €1.3bn transaction last week.

Previous funding
The homecare services company has been private equity-backed since 2007, when Equistone (formerly Barclays Private Equity) acquired GHD in a deal worth upwards of €100m. IK acquired the company from Barclays in a secondary buyout in September 2010.

Company
Founded in 1992, GHD is a German homecare services company. Its 1,700 employees provide the company's own medical products and services to 140,000 patients. 1,100 employees are nurses and trained medical staff. Headquartered in Ahrensburg, GHD has an additional eight treatment branches across Germany.

People
Andreas Rudolph is CEO of GHD. Detlef Dinsel is managing partner at IK. Joakim Lundvall is head of Germany at NC Advisory, adviser to the Nordic Capital Funds.