International legal practice Osborne Clarke's specialist Management advisory practice has advised the management team of a property holding company backed by a portfolio of investors led by Centerbridge Partners L.P. on the sale of its real estate assets for an aggregate purchase price of approximately US$2 billion to Medical Properties Trust, Inc. The transaction represents the largest real estate deal of 2019. Medical Properties Trust, Inc. is based in Birmingham, Alabama and is a self-advised real estate investment trust formed in 2003 to acquire and develop net-leased hospital facilities.
The acquired healthcare portfolio consists of 30 acute care hospital facilities located throughout the United Kingdom. The facilities are leased under long-term inflation protected net leases to affiliates of BMI Healthcare, the largest private operator of acute hospitals in the United Kingdom The portfolio will provide invaluable hospitals essential to meet growing demand for UK Healthcare.
In a parallel transaction, Osborne Clarke's Management Advisory team also advised the management team of BMI Healthcare on the related disposal, for an undisclosed sum, of BMI Healthcare to Circle Health, in a deal that will deliver a new generation of best-in-class hospitals. Circle, an award winning operator of UK acute hospitals, currently operates two state-of-the-art independent hospitals in Bath and Reading with a third due to open shortly in Birmingham. In addition, they run various integrated care programmes, rehabilitation services, and have an overseas division which operates two purpose-built clinics in Shanghai, China.
BMI Healthcare operates more than 50 hospitals and healthcare facilities where more than 6,500 Consultants practise and which handle more than two million patient visits a year. Under the deal Circle Health will assume all of BMI Healthcare's facilities in the United Kingdom and has committed to a multi-million pound program of investment in facility infrastructure, technology and people as part of the transaction.
Both management teams were advised by Private Equity Partner Mark Spinner, Associate Director Pippa Byrne, Senior Associate Seamus McKimm, Associate Alec Bartlett and Trainee Solicitor Georgie Taylor.
Osborne Clarke’s specialist Management Advisory Practice has many years’ of in-depth direct experience of providing pragmatic and commercially focused advice to senior managers. Our dedicated team of management advisory lawyers work side by side with our clients through every aspect of the transaction.
