Lee Equity Partners (LEP) announced on June 17 the acquisition of Integrated Medical Professionals (IMP) and The Urology Group (TUG) to form Solaris Health, a management services organization. According to the release from LEP, it will be one of the nation’s largest providers of urological and other specialty services. LEP plans to use Solaris Health as the foundation for a national platform that attracts leading independent urological partners.
For the two practices, LEP spent roughly $240 million, according to sources cited in PE HUB. TUG and IMP have combined estimated revenue of $270 million and $25 million in EBITDA.
IMP is a urology-centric multi-specialty practice with 81 physicians based in New York, NY and TUG is a leading independent group of urologists with 39 physicians on staff based in Cincinnati, Ohio. Solaris Health will have upwards of 525,000 patient encounters a year at more than 60 sites in New York, Ohio, Kentucky, and Indiana.
According to our Deal Search Online database, LEP hasn’t made any investments in physician groups in over two years. In early March 2018, its portfolio company Prelude Fertility Inc., purchased Advanced Fertility Center of Chicago, a provider of advanced fertility, in vitro fertilization and egg donation services to the Chicago market. LEP formed Prelude Fertility in 2016 with entrepreneur Martin Varsavsky, Reproductive Biology Associates, and MyEggBank.
LEP, instead, has focused on the Behavioral Health Care sector in recent years through its portfolio company, Summit BHC. LEP and FFL Partners teamed up to acquire a controlling stake in Summit BHC in October 2017 and have been building up the company’s network since then.
In 2018, Summit BHC announced two transactions, acquiring Cottonwood Tuscon, a 65-bed behavioral health treatment and addiction rehabilitation center, and St. Gregory Retreat Center, a 56-bed treatment center for substance abuse. The deals gave Summit BHC a presence in the Arizona and Iowa marketplace, respectively.
The last deal Summit BHC announced was back in January 2020 for Peak View Behavioral Health, a 112-bed acute psychiatric and behavioral health hospital based in Colorado.
