The Market for PBMs Slows in 2016

Magellan Health, Inc. (NASDAQ: MGLN), a healthcare management company specializing in special populations and pharmacy benefits management, has just acquired privately held Veridicus Holdings, LLC. The sellers are Gauge Capital, company management and other unnamed backers. Based in Salt Lake City, Veridicus is a pharmacy benefit management (PBM) company that uses proprietary software to integrate pharmacy, medical and lab data to drive targeted interventions for complex patient populations. The $74.5 million deal gives Magellan access to Veridicus’ 225,000 members. Veridicus also owns and operates a fully licensed insurance company which serves members enrolled in the Medicare Part D... Read More »

CROs Are Back, Many with Specialties

We’ve documented the increase in biotechnology acquisitions and license deals by pharmaceutical companies in previous posts. But the impact of pharma’s move away from in-house R&D has benefited other sectors of the healthcare industry, particularly clinical research organizations (CROs). For those outside the technology side of healthcare, CROs provide outsourced research services to the pharmaceutical, biotechnology, and medical device industries on a contract basis. Through mid-November, we’ve seen an increase of 325% in deal volume for CROs, compared with the year before. In 2015, just five deals for these targets were announced. So far this year, 17 are on the... Read More »

November Sees a Surge in Lab Deals

Four deals in our Laboratories, MRI & Dialysis sector have been announced in the first half of November. That much activity constitutes a surge for this sector, which now stands at 39 deals through all of 2016. With only six weeks left in the year, it seems unlikely that this sector will surpass 2015’s total of 52 deals. On November 1st, Vital Images, Inc., a subsidiary of Toshiba Medical Systems Group, acquired Karos Health for an undisclosed price. Karos Health provides standards-based clinical imaging exchange and cross-enterprise workflow and diagnostic imaging solutions. The combined technologies provide a customer-centric, modular platform that allows hospital systems to solve a... Read More »

Rehabilitation Deals Still Rising, Thanks to Private Equity

The year isn’t over, and the Rehabilitation sector has already equaled last year’s deal total. Thirty-three deals have been made public through November 11, 2016, compared with 33 in all of 2015. Spending is a bit lower at this point in 2016, at $623 million, down 21% compared with last year’s annual total of $799 million. That may change, depending on the number of deals that disclose prices between now and the end of the year. Four private equity firms have made acquisitions in this sector in 2016. Even though no price was disclosed, the largest was probably from Advent International, which acquired ATI Physical Therapy, a platform company based in Bolingbrook,... Read More »

PSA Healthcare Broadens its Texas Footprint

PSA Healthcare, a portfolio company of J.H. Whitney Capital Partners, and a provider of pediatric home care for children with medical complexities, just expanded its presence in Texas to 12 offices with the acquisition of two Texas-based home health care agencies. The targets are Innovations Health Services of Tyler and San Antonio, Texas and Assure Home Healthcare of San Antonio, Texas. Both provide private-duty nursing to medically fragile children and their families in Texas. The Tyler location represents a new market for PSA. The San Antonio offices of Assure and Innovations represent a major investment in one of Texas’ largest markets for pediatric home care. This is PSA’s third... Read More »

Physician Medical Group Sector Heats Up

Ten months into the year, and only two healthcare sectors have posted gains compared with 2015 totals. On the technology side, it’s eHealth, where deal volume is up 10% through the end of October, to 139 transactions. On the services side, it’s Physician Medical Groups. Deal volume now stands at 102 transactions, a 13% increase over last year’s 90 deals. (See chart below.) The Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act (MACRA) is one factor behind the increase in physician practice acquisitions. Although the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services eased some rules regarding data reporting periods, timing and payment options, the law still calls for smaller practices to have digital... Read More »