IHH Healthcare reiterates commitment to Fortis Healthcare and India,
IHH Healthcare reiterates commitment to Fortis Healthcare and India, as it awaits direction from the Supreme Court on Fortis plea
“Growing in India remains a priority for IHH as it is one of our four home markets, together with Malaysia, Singapore and Turkey.
We respect and have full faith in the judicial process in India and look forward to a favourable outcome so we can proceed with the open offer. This will allow IHH to further invest into Fortis to provide even more support to the Indian healthcare sector, especially in critical times like now with COVID-19. Our focus, as the largest shareholder in Fortis, is to bring the best of our knowledge and expertise to help the Fortis leadership with the company’s continued turnaround and to deliver even more trusted, quality care for all our patients in India.”
Dr Kelvin Loh
Managing Director and CEO, IHH Healthcare
IHH Healthcare (“IHH” or the “Group”) today reiterated its commitment to India, announcing its intent to continue on its growth plans for Fortis Healthcare Limited (“Fortis”). This comes ahead of the upcoming hearing in the Hon’ble Supreme Court of India on whether IHH can be allowed to proceed with its open offer to acquire additional shares in Fortis. The Group acquired a 31% controlling stake in Fortis in 2018, which triggered a mandatory open offer to acquire another 26% of Fortis shares from the market. The open offer has not proceeded due to ongoing legal proceedings with respect to the transaction1pending before the Hon’ble Supreme Court where the next hearing is scheduled for 10th February 2021.
India is the Group’s fourth home market, together with Malaysia, Singapore and Turkey. Between Fortis and IHH’s Global Hospitals and Continental Hospitals, the Group is a leading private healthcare operator in India with a network of more than 30 hospitals. 1 IHH’s stated position is that the Group had gone through the transaction with the necessary corporate and regulatory approvals in accordance with all applicable laws.
Continued turnaround of Fortis
As the largest shareholder and working closely with the Fortis management team, IHH has put in place and continues to execute on a turnaround plan for Fortis which had been facing financial difficulties. Over the past two years, Fortis has progressively strengthened its balance sheet, improved its financial liquidity as well as streamlined its organisational struct ure to become more efficient. This has helped Fortis to remain resilient amid the impact of COVID-19, and to continue to play a critical role in supporting the Indian Government in combatting the pandemic. For its latest financial results for Q3 FY2021, Fortis posted a strong recovery from the previous quarter on an accelerated recovery and pick up in business momentum. Its robust performance means it is now positioning for growth and expansion of both of its core businesses – hospitals and diagnostics.
Partnering the government to fight the COVID-19 war
Fortis has also championed support of the Indian Government’s COVID-19 efforts. Besides taking in COVID-19 patients to ease the load on public healthcare facilities, Fortis is also supporting COVID-19 testing and has roll ed out teleconsult services to help more remote patients access medical support. More than 110,000 teleco nsults has been conducted across Fortis Network hospitals. To date, Fortis has treated more than 24,000 COV ID-19 patients and donated ₹8.4 crore (US$ 1.15 million) towards COVID-19 relief and research efforts, inc luding to the Prime Minister’ National Relief Fund (PMNRF). When the crisis was at its peak, Fortis had set aside more beds on top of the 1,300 already designated for COVID-19 patients should the need arise, and is suppo rting the government in administering its vaccination programme.
On 14th August 2020, Fortis announced its intent to rebrand as ‘Parkway’, an IHH brand that is synonymous with excellence in patient-centric, quality care in Asia, which will be rolled out once it receives approval from the Ho n’ble Supreme Court. This is in line with the Group’s ongoing efforts to drive greater synergies across its internat ional network of 80 hospitals across 10 countries as part of its Refreshed Strategy, and another indication of its commitment to Fortis and India.
For more information or to speak to an IHH spokesperson, please contact:
Janet Low
Corporate Communications t. +65 9017 8094
- janet.low@ihhhealthcare.com
Josephine Chew
WATATAWA Consulting t. +65 9061 0353
- jchew@we-watatawa.com
ABOUT IHH HEALTHCARE BERHAD (“IHH”)
As a leading international healthcare operator, IHH believes in the sustained demand for quality private health care in its home and growth markets. We are key players in our home markets of Malaysia, Singapore, Turkey and India, and key growth market of Greater China (including Hong Kong). We employ over 65,000 people and operate over 15,000 licensed beds across 80 hospitals in 10 countries worldwide. Our vision is to become the world’s most trusted healthcare services network and we will continue to make healthcare services more conv enient and transparent to our patients. We offer our patients a full spectrum of integrated healthcare services from clinics to hospitals to quaternary care and a wide range of ancillary services across our portfolio which comprises of premium-brand healthcare assets, collectively representing a unique multi-market investment position in the healthcare sector.
- Parkway Pantai Limited is one of Asia’s largest integrated private healthcare groups with a network of 31 hospitals throughout the region, including Malaysia, Singapore, India, Greater China and Brunei. “Mount Elizabeth”, “Gleneagles”, “Parkway” and “Pantai” are among the most prestigious brands in Asia.
- Acibadem Holdings is Turkey’s leading private healthcare provider, offering integrated healthcare services across 21 hospitals in Turkey, Macedonia, Bulgaria and the Netherlands. The “Acibadem” brand is renowned for its clinical excellence in the Central & Eastern Europe, Middle East and North Africa (“CEEMENA”) region.
- Fortis Healthcare Limited is a leading integrated private healthcare provider in India. It operates across a network of 28 hospitals and 415 diagnostic centres in India, Dubai and Sri Lanka. Fortis is listed on the National Stock Exchange of India Ltd and Bombay Stock Exchange.
- IMU Health is IHH’s medical education arm and oversees the established higher learning institutions of International Medical College (“IMC”) and International Medical University (“IMU”) in Malaysia.
More information can be found at www.ihhhealthcare.com.
