The initial public offering (IPO) carried out by Romanian private clinic and hospital operator MedLife on the Bucharest Stock Exchange was priced at RON 26 per share, 25% lower than the maximum asking price of RON 35. The company, which is market leader on the local private healthcare services market, was thus valued by investors at close to EUR 116 million.

Private equity firm Value4Capital and the International Finance Corporation (IFC) got some EUR 50 mln from selling a 44% stake in the company. Value4Capital sold its whole 36.25% stake in the company while IFC sold 7.75% and kept close to 5% of MedLife’s shares.

The Romanian Marcu family, who control 51% of MedLife’s shares, have their stake valued at EUR 59 million. They will not sell any shares in the next six months.

Most of the shares sold in the IPO were bought by institutional investors, including local pension funds, mutual funds, investment companies, as well as foreign investors.

The individual and non-professional investors were allotted some 15% of offer. The demand on the retail tranche was over three times higher than the number of shares allotted. Most retail investors placed their orders in the first days of the subscription period to get the 5% discount to the final IPO price. They will thus pay RON 24.7 per share instead of RON 26, which is the price paid by institutional investors.

MedLife’s shares will start trading on the Bucharest Stock Exchange on December 21. MedLife will be the first local company whose ticker is made of only one letter - M. Most companies listed on the Bucharest Stock Exchange have their tickers made of three letters, with Fondul Proprietatea - FP being another notable exception.

Raiffeisen Bank was Lead Global Coordinator and Lead Joint Bookrunner for the MedLife IPO. Czech brokerage firm Wood & Company was Co-Global Coordinator and Joint Bookrunner.

MedLife is the first private company to get listed on the Bucharest Stock Exchange following a succesful IPO after more than eight years. The previous private listing was that of PVC pipe and profile producer Teraplast Bistrita, in early-2008, before the financial crisis hit Romania and the local capital market.

MedLife operates 36 clinics, 8 generalist and specialized hospitals, 24 labs, 9 pharmacies, 8 dental clinics. It has some 1,900 doctors and 1,100 nurses. The group has over 500,000 clients who subscribe to prevention medical service packages.

The group estimates a turnover of EUR 120 million this year, up from EUR 88 million in 2015. In the first nine months of 2016, MedLife had sales of EUR 80.8 million and an operating profit (EBITDA) of EUR 8.7 million.

editor@romania-insider.com