Dr BS Ajaikumar on CVC selling Healthcare Global controlling stake, future plans and more

economictimes.indiatimes.com:

Dr BS Ajaikumar, Executive Chairman, Healthcare Global, says they are focussed on achieving margin and growth will definitely happen. The challenge has been that with the new centres coming in, while the mature centres are giving a margin of over 22%, the best centres gives a margin of close to 30%. So, while this is happening, they plan to do a few more M&As. That will bring down the margin level. But even with that, Ajaikumar is confident that margin will be in the upper teens, reaching close to 20% towards the last quarter of next year (FY25-26).

According to reports, CVC Capital is looking to sell stake in Healthcare Global. They hold 60.4% stake. Any indication how much they are going to sell? Will that trigger an open offer? Dr BS Ajaikumar: Yes, as I always say, the best person to answer is CVC. If they do plan to exit, they have to sell 60%. Yes, it will be an open offer also and from what we understand, they will be the best persons to answer these questions. As far as HCG is concerned, we have really made no change in the plans. We think we are on a very good growth trajectory.

As we have indicated, even in our investors call, we have done some M&A. We have future plans for growth of existing centres as well as some new centres, including brownfield and in the future, we are looking at greenfield possibilities. So, we are on a good scale to expand. Oncology is expanding rapidly across India and we being the number one oncology player in the country, there is a strategicopportunity for us to grow in all