Fortis Healthcare targets brownfield expansion in India

Company expects its business portfolio to continue with 80% domestic business, 20% international operations

Fortis Healthcare, with an eye on the Indian healthcare market, is looking at a potential capacity of around 10,000 beds from its currently operational capacity of around 4,000 beds. The company is expecting its business portfolio to continue with 80 per cent domestic business and 20 per cent international, while the ratio was 50:50 sometime back, said Vishal Bali, Group CEO, Fortis Healthcare Ltd.

“We can have around 10,000 beds in the system, of which around 4,000 beds are our current capacity. We will be increasing the capacity within the existing facilities and would look at greenfield,” said Bali.

While he refused to put any timeline to reach the 10,000 beds, Bali said this year it would be adding around 1,500 beds. Three hospitals - Gurgaon, Chennai and Ludhiana - are expected to be operational soon.

Under the asset light model of the company, investments into infrastructure, land and civil works will be carried out by the Religare Health Trust. Fortis would have to invest around 30 per cent of the expected investment, which would reduce the burden of investment from the company.

A recent investor presentation from the company says  almost 80 per cent of the potential bed additions, that is around 4,600 beds, would be from installed capacity and would be brownfield expansion while the greenfield expansion would be of around 1,100 beds.