Aster DM Healthcare to focus on Expansion in South, West India, to invest Rs 650 crore: Report

Kochi: Aster DM Healthcare, a privately held Indian health care provider backed by Dr Azad Moopen is planning to infuse over Rs 650 crore in the next couple of years. Aster intends to increase its total hospital bed capacity to 6000 from the present stats of 4800 beds.

Confirmation to this effect was made by the Billionaire founder Dr Azad Moopen to the daily Business Today. Moopen informed that his focus will be on developing new medical facilities in the southern region of India.

In 1987, Dr Moopen started with a single clinic in Dubai now owns a network of healthcare facilities with over 323 establishments consisting of hospitals, clinics and pharmacies in the Middle East, India and the Philippines. Currently, it has twenty-one hospitals in India and the Middle East.

The hospitals in India are located in Kochi, Kolhapur, Kozhikode, Kottakkal, Bengaluru, Vijayawada, Guntur, Ongole, Wayanad and Hyderabad. Aster owns over 100 clinics and a pharmacy chain in the Middle East, both with proceeds of Rs 2,000 crore per year. Aster has begun few clinics on a pilot basis in Bangalore and depending on its success, it will plan to increase the number of clinics on a commercial scale.

Dr Moopen informed that Aster which has started a 670-bedded Medicity on a 42-acre campus in Kochi, plans to add more specialities and novel services like senior living and so on. The company is scouting for new facilities in Mumbai, Pune and in Thiruvananthapuram and will limit its focus to South and West India.

An addition of a new hospital at Angol in Andhra Pradesh was recently seen. At Kannur in Kerela, a 250 bedded hospital will soon be functional and another 230 plus bedded hospital will commence by April in Bangalore.

Earlier, the Dubai based healthcare had invested Rs 600 crore over various Kerala-based projects including a 500-bed super-speciality hospital in Thiruvananthapuram.

Also Read: Aster DM Healthcare to invest Rs 600 crore in Kerala in 3 years

As learnt by the company's recent plan, within the next couple of years and a half, a tertiary care hospital with a capacity of 500 beds in Chennai will be commissioned.

Besides, four more new hospitals are lined to come up in the gulf. The hospitals will be erected in Dubai, Sharjah and Oman, Dr Azad Moopen told Business Today.

"Our idea is to focus only on tertiary care in cities and we are exploring new facilities in Mumbai, Pune and in Thiruvananthapuram, where we have purchased land. Currently, our focus is to restrict expansion only to South and West India," Dr Moopen told the daily.

Aster earned about Rs 1,000 crore from its India business in the previous year and is likely to have over Rs 1,300 crore earnings in 2018-19 from the 11 facilities operational in India. Gross Rs 5,500 crore has been invested over the years wherein 40 per cent of the investment has been in India. 50 per cent of its consolidated revenue is generated from the operation of hospitals.

Aster DM Healthcare is listed in the Bombay Stock Exchange.

Also Read: Columbia Asia to invest Rs 400 Crore in 2 new hospitals in India