Fortis Healthcare plans to add 1,500 new beds to its network in 3 years

Fortis Healthcare Ltd plans to add around 1,500 new beds to its network to take the total to around 5,000 beds in the next three years, according to company officials.

The company has also lined up a capex of Rs 400 crore for the ongoing fiscal which will be divided equally on maintenance and growth programmes.

The healthcare chain is continuing with its portfolio rationalisation programme aligning with its focus on cluster approach to grow both organically via brownfield expansion and inorganically in geographies of Delhi-NCR, Maharashtra, Bangalore and Kolkata, Fortis Healthcare Ltd Managing Director and CEO Ashutosh Raghuvanshi told analysts.

"Our plans to add 1,200 beds in the existing facilities over the next few years are well underway," he said.

Elaborating on the new beds addition programme, Fortis Healthcare CFO Vivek Kumar Goyal said at present the company had 4,000 beds and the target is to reach around 5,000 beds in the next three years.

Stating that the company's "1,300 to 1,500 brownfield-bed expansion is online", he said,"Out of this 1,500, 600 beds is a ramp up of the existing facility... the bed capacity we have built but we have not operationalised the bed. We are opening up the bed as per the market condition..."

The balance, he said, will be a "sort of brownfield" where the company is building new towers in existing facilities.

Goyal said in the current financial year Fortis expects to increase its operational bed by around 250 beds, adding, "there is one contract where we have come out in Dehradun, there will be a reduction of bed facility. So, overall around 200 beds increase should be there by the year-end."

Last year, the company had added 120 beds, he said.

When asked about capex, Goyal said, "FY2023 we are targeting around Rs 400 crore capex which includes maintenance and growth capex...(and) allocate 50:50 for both."

Asked about Fortis' strategy for expansion, Raghuvanshi said, "Greenfield is not a preferred way of expanding for us, that is a last option. The only situation or circumstances in which we would choose a greenfield would be, that if there is a cluster where there is a very potential future site."

Citing the example of north Bangalore, he said it "has less hospitals so that would be one area where we could consider a greenfield hospital. So, it has to be a growth area, it has to be an area where the greenfield properties are available and then only we will consider. Otherwise it will have to be a brownfield or an organic model only.