MANILA, Philippines--Infrastructure holding firm Metro Pacific Investments Corp. plans to invest an additional P208.4 million in the company that owns and operates the 500-bed Makati Medical Center, as part of the expansion of its health care business.
In a disclosure to the Philippine Stock Exchange yesterday, MPIC, which is chaired by Manuel V. Pangilinan, announced that Makati Med operator Medical Doctors Inc. (MDI) was offering to existing shareholders a total of 181,226 new shares at P1,150 a share.
MPIC has agreed to subscribe to and acquire all the shares corresponding to its stock rights entitlement. It has also offered to take up any shares that other MDI shareholders would not subscribe to.
This participation was approved by its board of directors in a meeting last Wednesday, the disclosure said.
If MPIC ends up subscribing to all the new shares offered, its interest in MDI will rise to 36.35 percent from the current 32.39 percent.
The healthcare business currently has the smallest share of MPIC?s infrastructure portfolio, but is growing rapidly in terms of revenue contribution.
The vision is to hit the critical mass of 3,000 to 5,000 hospital beds and form the largest hospital chain in the country.
Aside from MDI, MPIC also owns about a third of the 250-bed Davao Doctors Hospital and operates the 250-bed Cardinal Santos Medical Center under a 20-year concession agreement with the Archdiocese of Manila.
In the first half of this year, MPIC?s hospital group posted about P2.6 billion in revenues and about P245 million in net profit.
For this year through 2012, MPIC president Jose Ma. Lim had said in a recent corporate review that about P2 billion in new funds would be earmarked to upgrade the equipment, add doctors? offices and rehabilitate existing rooms of the three hospitals.
This budget, however, does not include the cost of acquiring new hospitals if an opportunity arises.
MPIC sees a lot of synergies that can be created in managing a chain of hospitals, such as in purchasing of medicine and medical supplies.
