Integrated Buys Acibadem, Plans $2B IPO

Integrated Healthcare Holdings Sdn., Asia’s biggest hospital operator, is planning an initial public offering that may raise up to $2 billion after it completes the purchase of a Turkish hospital chain, said two people with knowledge of the matter.

The company, controlled by Malaysia’s sovereign wealth fund Khazanah Nasional Bhd., asked banks to submit proposals for the IPO by tomorrow, said the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the process is private. The share sale will take place in the first half of 2012 in Singapore or Kuala Lumpur, they said.

The Kuala Lumpur-based company is in advanced talks to buy a majority stake in Turkey’s Acibadem Saglik Hizmetleri & Ticaret AS for about $1 billion, one of the people said. Integrated Healthcare expects to reach an agreement on the acquisition next month, the person said.

Integrated Healthcare’s Parkway Pantai Ltd. unit runs 16 hospitals in Singapore, Malaysia, India and Brunei. Integrated Healthcare also owns the International Medical University in Kuala Lumpur, and a stake in India’s Apollo Hospitals Enterprise Ltd. (APHS)

Khazanah spokesman Mohd Asuki Abas declined to comment on the IPO plans. Dow Jones Newswires reported on the IPO earlier today, citing unidentified people.

Government Push

Parkway Pantai, which employs about 13,700 people, is planning eight more hospitals in Singapore, Malaysia, Vietnam, China, India and the United Arab Emirates, according to a company presentation last month. The unit is made up of Singapore-based Parkway Holdings Ltd. and Malaysia’s Pantai Hospitals Sdn.

Mitsui & Co., Japan’s second-biggest trading company, said in April it will buy a 30 percent stake in Integrated Healthcare for 3.3 billion ringgit. That valued the company at 11 billion ringgit, which would make it the biggest among publicly traded hospital operators in Asia, based on Bloomberg data.

A $2 billion listing in Kuala Lumpur would be Malaysia’s biggest IPO since Petronas Chemicals Bhd.’s 12.8 billion ringgit ($4.1 billion) offering last November. In Singapore it would be the largest since Hutchison Port Holdings Trust’s $5.5 billion share sale in March.

Khazanah, which owns the rest of Integrated Healthcare, said the same month that it plans to list the company as Malaysia’s government pushes state organizations to divest commercial holdings to attract foreign investors and boost stock market liquidity.

The fund is already the biggest shareholder in some of Malaysia’s largest companies, including power producer Tenaga Nasional Bhd., lender CIMB Group Holdings Bhd. and national carrier Malaysian Airline System Bhd.

To contact the reporter on this story: Joyce Koh in Singapore at jkoh38@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Philip Lagerkranser at lagerkranser@bloomberg.net