Dental Corporation boosts funding to drive growth
October 08 Media Release
Dental Corporation boosts funding to drive growth
Dental Corporation Holdings Ltd (DC) announced today that it had secured $21 million in capital funding from National Australia Bank (NAB) to help fund DC’s expansion program.
In conjunction with this capital injection from NAB’s Integrated Capital Solutions division, DC also increased its debt financing facility and introduced Bankwest as a partner to NAB in its debt syndicate.
DC Executive Chairman Mark Evans said “NAB’s investment is a fantastic validation of our business model and underpins the opportunity we have in Australia’s dental industry. NAB has been a great supporter of our business and we look forward to having it as a major investor.”
DC is Australia’s largest provider of dental services owning or having under purchase agreement over 70 dental practices Australia wide. DC is the leader in the consolidation of Australia’s dental industry having grown from acquiring its first practice in October 2007 to now having annualised revenues in excess of $100 million.
DC Chairman Mark Evans said “The capital investment from NAB combined with the extension of our debt facility provides us with over $100 million in new funding to continue our acquisition program. Our partnership approach and hands‐off management model have proved very attractive to the larger size dental practices which characterise our target market. All our principal dentists are shareholders in DC and in fact make up the largest shareholder group”.
Head of NAB’s Integrated Capital Solutions division, Graham Reid, said “we were attracted by Dental Corporation’s strong cashflows, outstanding management systems and market leading position”. The fact that management and the dentists are significant shareholders was also an important factor in our investment decision.”
The DC business model has been created to incentivise performance while providing back‐office support to the practices and allowing them to maintain their operational and clinical independence. The group only targets larger practices providing outstanding clinical care to patients that are running their businesses effectively.
According to Dr Nick Hocking “joining Dental Corporation has been great for both my practice and me personally ‐ I can now focus entirely on what I do best – Dentistry. The support I have received from DC and also other DC dentists has allowed me to significantly increase my practice revenue since joining”.
With the additional funding DC is set to continue to expand its operations across Australia. According to DC Executive Director Dr Ray Khouri ”the success of Dental Corporation to date has resulted from the fact that we are partnering with the best practices in the country and have built a foundation for sustainable growth. DC recognises and respects the achievement of our principal dentists in building their businesses and as such maintains a hands‐off management approach offering support in accounting, administration, IT, HR and marketing to ensure they are able to focus on what they do best ‐ dentistry, and continue to do so and in return be rewarded for their efforts”.
ABOUT DENTAL CORPORATION
Dental Corporation is Australia’s largest provider of dental services, owning or having under contract over 70 practices across Australia with the aim of doubling this number in the next 12 months.
DC was founded in 2007 to partner with and acquire high quality general and specialist dental practices. Our aim is to provide dental services of the highest standard and we have some of Australia’s most respected and successful dentists as practice principals.
Our fundamental approach to ongoing practice management is to retain the autonomy of the individual practices and we do not become involved in day‐to‐day operations of our practices; choosing to rather incentivise and provide the support infrastructure to the practice principals to allow them to continue to grow the practice.
While retaining their operational autonomy practices choosing to join DC obtain access to world‐class support in the areas of financial administration and management, payroll and accounts payable, purchasing and materials sourcing and IT, HR and marketing.
Since completing the acquisition of our first practice in October 2007 DC now has annualised revenue in excess of $100m in this is expected to double over the next 12 months. Since mid‐ 2007 DC has now raised over $42m in capital funding, issued approximately $25m in equity to dentists and in‐conjunction with undrawn debt facilities has in excess of $100m to invest in the acquisition of new dental practices.
FOR MORE INFORMATION
Mark Evans – Executive Chairman
Dental Corporation
0418372849 or mevans@dentalcorp.com.au