Nashville-based LifePoint Health, a company with 80 rural hospitals and owned by private equity firm Apollo Asset Management, is negotiating to buy Ardent Health Services, which operates 30 hospitals in six states.
The deal would create a $10-billion hospital chain.
Ardent operates acute-care hospitals in growing urban and suburban areas, mostly in Oklahoma and Texas.
Equity Group Investments bought a majority share of Ardent in 2015 for $475 million from Ventas, a real estate trust. Equity Group then added more hospitals to Ardent and has since more than doubled its annual revenue to $4.4 billion, according to Ardent’s website.
Apollo bought LifePoint in 2018 for about $5.6 billion, merged it with RCCH Healthcare Partners, and continued buying other Nashville-area health services.
The current potential sale, valuing Ardent at about $2 billion, would enable LifePoint to expand into larger markets and gain purchasing power with suppliers. It also would streamline the management of the two companies into one administrative center.
Private equity firms have been expanding their holdings in health care in recent years, buying clinics and hospitals to profit from an aging population’s rising spending on medical care.
The purchases often have been laden with debt and have prompted ire from regulators and politicians who have accused companies of prioritizing profit over quality care for patients.
TREND FORECAST: As the late, great comedian George Carlin said, “It’s one big club, and you ain’t in it.” We note this merger deal to again emphasize how the Big’s continue to get bigger as small businesses are either put out of business by them or gobbled up.
We have also detailed that there is a burgeoning “Youth Revolution” spreading across the continents. Among the critical elements of this movement is a rebellion against the one percent: Class Warfare. New political parties will be formed as the young, having a dire future and with nothing left to lose, will be losing it… especially as the “Greatest Depression” drives them deeper into despair.
