BEIJING, Aug. 30 (Xinhua) -- With the delivery ceremony to be held on August 31 in Spain, Aier Eye Hospital Group Co., Ltd. (SZ.300015) will become the first Chinese private company to acquire a Spanish listed company through a tend offer.
Aier, a leading hospital network in eye care area of China, is the first listed medical institution in the country. As of July 2017, Aier has established more than 180 ophthalmic hospitals covering 30 provinces in China, with an annual outpatient volume of over 4 million.
Recently, Aier has successfully established its branches in Hong Kong and the United States through mergers and acquisitions.
Experts believe that the promotion of Aier’s globalization strategy will enable it to learn advanced medical technology and management system from its foreign partners and also help the Chinese brand to become reputed in the global ophthalmic industry.
-- Choosing the target
The target company Clinica Baviera, which has been established for 25 years, is Europe's largest listed chain of ophthalmic medical institutions. Currently, the company operates 76 ophthalmic medical centers in Spain, Germany, Italy, Austria and other countries.
Zhang Yongmei, director of the international department of Aier, said that “the target company has been engaged in ophthalmic industry for a long time and has experiences in transnational and cross-region development. It is a very suitable partner for Aier to expand service to overseas market and integrate with domestic resources.”
The acquisition will enable Aier to become the world's largest ophthalmic medical group covering six countries in three continents, with more than 260 ophthalmic hospitals and ophthalmic clinics.
Aier has quickened the pace to go abroad in the recent years. Aier chairman Chen Bang recently said that "Aier will work with the world's leading ophthalmology research institutes to carry out comprehensive strategic cooperation in depth and acquire the world-influential ophthalmic chains in a bid to build a global network.”
Additionally, it will discuss the possibility of implementing international mergers and acquisitions towards upstream or downstream of the ophthalmic service industry chain to meet the need of the group’s development.
-- Financing for the deal
As a privately owned medical organization, financing plays an important role in completing overseas mergers and acquisitions. Financing is extremely important especially for this acquisition, as it costs more than previous acquisitions.
BNP Paribas stood out from a group of bidders to become Aier’s financial consultant. Zhang Yongmei introduced that there were two main reasons that BNP Paribas granted full-amount loan to Aier: first, the target company has stable cash flow and is engaged in the booming industry; second, Aier has good credit status, low liability level, rapid and stable business growth and sound development strategy.
Loaning from banks effectively reduced the financing cost of such acquisition.
-- Integration after transaction
Wu Shijun, secretary of the board, said that the acquisition is not aiming at delisting the target company and Aier is expected to become the world's only ophthalmic chain dual-listed in China and overseas.
Different from ophthalmic medical organizations of smaller sizes Aier has acquired in Hong Kong and America, Clinica Baviera is an ophthalmic medical group covering 4 European countries. For this reason, Aier Group filed an application for anti-monopoly investigation to European Union in the acquisition.
Currently, the group’s overseas merger and acquisition strategy is very clear: merging and acquiring ophthalmic industry peers with high quality medical teams, research capacities, mature and sound operation and good return of investment to increase Aier Group’s strength in the ophthalmic medical industry and improve its position in the global medical industry.
During the acquiring process, Aier Group retained the minor shareholder position of critical personnel and founders of Clinica Baviera and allowed them to continue to participate in management to help steady and smooth completion of integration after the deal.
In the transitional period, the group will gradually cultivate the management team in the local region. For employees of the acquired company, Aier will retain all employees on a free will basis and to guarantee employees’ benefits and incentive mechanism.
Additionally, Aier Group would arrange a professional integration team to prepare the integration plan to ensure smooth communication with the management personnel of the acquired company.
(Contributed by Chen Yuxiao, edited by Yang Qi, kateqiyang@xinhua.org)
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