The Acquisition Represents Gulf Capital’s Fourth Technology-Related Investment to Date
Abu Dhabi: Gulf Capital, one of the largest and most active alternative asset management firms in the Middle East, announced today that it has acquired a majority stake in ACCUMED Practice Management, the leading revenue cycle management (RCM) company in the GCC. The company post acquisition will continue to deliver its services under the current leadership and will be looking to expand its management team and add key executives to strengthen its operations.
ACCUMED leverages its proprietary technology and processes to help public and private healthcare providers in the UAE, KSA and Kuwait to improve medical documentation, enhance billing cycles, optimise revenues and accelerate collections. The firm is the first, and currently the largest, in the Middle East to offer RCM managed services, and has managed more than nine million medical claims worth over AED 4.1 Billion till date. The scope of ACCUMED’s services include comprehensive business process outsourcing, medical coding, technology solutions, consultancy services and staff augmentation, covering all medical insurance billing needs for hospitals, clinics, diagnostic centres and other healthcare providers.
The company is benefiting from the general growth in the healthcare market in the Middle East, the growing penetration of health insurance, maturing regulation and the growing outsourcing trend in the industry. Today, many healthcare providers perform non-core activities such as medical coding and billing in-house. This is expected to change with increased penetration of outsourcing in non-core functions, allowing for higher efficiency and lower costs and enabling healthcare providers to focus on the delivery of high quality medical care.
Dr. Karim El Solh, Chief Executive Officer of Gulf Capital, said: “This strategic investment in ACCUMED is an exciting one for Gulf Capital, as it offers our investors exposure to the fast-growing healthcare industry in the GCC, but without the capital intensity or regulatory risks usually associated with investments in the industry. ACCUMED is the clear market leader in revenue cycle management in the GCC, and we look forward to funding and supporting the growth of the company, so it can continue to deliver enhanced operational and financial performance improvements to healthcare providers in the GCC.”
The RCM industry is expected to grow at a compound annual growth rate of over 20% in UAE and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, as hospitals shift increasingly toward outsourcing non-core activities and reimbursement standards are streamlined. Currently in the UAE and KSA, up to 95% of all insurance claims are processed in-house by healthcare providers in what can be a labour intensive and costly process. In more mature markets such as the US, up to 50% of all insurance claims are outsourced to specialised RCM companies that have the scale and resources to invest in proprietary technology and highly trained staff. The GCC healthcare industry is expected to see a big shift towards the outsourcing of non-core RCM activities in line with the US market trends.
Dr. Ayham Refaat, Founder and CEO of ACCUMED, said: “ACCUMED is thrilled to partner with Gulf Capital, whose support and growth capital will allow us to extend our market leadership position and to accelerate our growth in the UAE, KSA and other regional markets. In addition to aggressively growing our core outsourced RCM business, the partnership with Gulf Capital will also allow us to add new services and to invest in cutting-edge technology to streamline and automate workflows – something our hospital clients don’t have the scale or the appetite to do in-house. We are excited about this new chapter in ACCUMED’s growth story in partnership with Gulf Capital.”
This latest acquisition represents Gulf Capital’s fourth investment in the technology sector. Gulf Capital has become one of the largest technology investors in the GCC, having injected to date over half a billion dirhams in regional technology, internet and ecommerce companies.
Ernst & Young acted as the financial and tax advisor, Alvarez and Marsal acted as the commercial advisor and Eversheds Sutherland acted as the legal advisor to Gulf Capital on this transaction. Guggenheim KBBO and Tribonian Law Advisors acted respectively as financial and legal advisors to the sellers.
About Gulf Capital:
Gulf Capital is one of the leading alternative asset management firms in the Middle East, investing across several asset classes including Private Equity, Private Debt and Real Estate. The Firm currently manages over AED 14.7 billion (US$4 billion) of assets across 10 funds and investment vehicles. Gulf Capital’s mission is to grow capital and build value with world-class expertise and best practices to generate sustainable superior performance for all stakeholders. Gulf Capital invests its own capital alongside its fund investors’ capital in all of the funds it launches. Gulf Capital received regional and international recognitions from industry peers and experts. The Firm was awarded the “Best Private Equity Firm in the Middle East” Award by Banker Middle East Magazine in 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014 and 2015 and the “Best Private Equity Firm” in the Middle East and North Africa by Private Equity International, as well as “Best SMEs Credit Fund in the Middle East’ in 2015 and “Best Alternative Asset Management Firm in the Middle East” in 2016 and 2017. The Firm is actively involved in real estate development through Gulf Related, its joint venture with the Related Companies, the leading private real estate developer in the United States. Gulf Related is focused on pursuing marquee large-scale mixed-use and residential real estate development opportunities in the UAE and Saudi Arabia. Gulf Capital also launched a Private Debt business, Gulf Credit Partners, which offers credit and mezzanine financing to meet the funding needs of fast-growing companies and to provide acquisition finance across the Middle East, North and Sub-Saharan Africa, as well as Turkey. With its private equity, real estate and private debt initiatives, Gulf Capital is today one of the largest and most diversified alternative asset managers in the Middle East.
About ACCUMED:
ACCUMED Practice Management was established in 2009 as the first company to provide outsourced Revenue Cycle Management solutions to the regional healthcare sector and to establish the Medical Billing industry in the Middle East.
Today ACCUMED is managing more than 100,000 insurance claims for GCC clients on a monthly bases and employs more than 200 professionals. ACCUMED works closely with Healthcare Providers and Payers to ensure successful and healthy system implementation by providing Revenue Cycle Management Solutions for Healthcare providers through a comprehensive package of services including Medical Coding, Billing, Insurance Validation, Financial and Consultancy services. ACCUMED works with Providers and Payers both to ensure successful and healthy system implementation by providing Practice Management Solutions for Medical Centers and Hospitals through our comprehensive package of services including Medical Coding, Billing, Insurance Validation, Financial and Consultancy services. ACCUMED’s team includes some of the region’s leading health professionals who have extensive experience in the re-engineering of many major health systems on both sides of medical services providers as well as medical services payers. We are considered experts in system design, costing & pricing, documentation management, medical coding, data analysis & trending, process optimization, denial management support and financial control.
