Premier healthcare alliance is eying an initial public offering worth up to $100 million, according to documents filed this week with the SEC. The group purchasing organization has yet to release the number of shares or the final price range for the offering.
Charlotte-based Premier noted that it had previously filed its registration documents in secret, but did not say how long the IPO had been in planning, although rumors have been flying for some time now. Premier plans to trade on the NASDAQ Capital Market under the symbol ‘PNC’.
Premier is a GPO aligning about 2,900 community hospitals and 100,000 "alternate" sites of care, encompassing some 400,000 physicians. The group generated about $869.3 million in revenue and $385.1 million in net income during fiscal 2013, according to SEC filings.
The company is currently owned by a consortium of 181 hospitals and healthcare groups, all of which will own Class B stock in the company after the IPO.
Premier, which calls itself "one of the nation’s largest performance improvement alliances," is perhaps most commonly known for its wide-ranging deals for hospital equipment and supplies. The group recently signed new contracts for drug-eluting and traditional stents with Abbott (NYSE:ABT), Boston Scientific (NYSE:BSX) and Medtronic (NYSE:MDT).
The GPO claims it provided its members with more than $5 billion in savings in fiscal 2012, and the group is a also a staple of healthcare performance improvement initiatives, including a collaboration with the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid. Premier also maintains deep data stores that in 2012 included information on 25% of U.S. patient discharges, 29% of annual hospital spending, $30 billion worth of annual direct labor expenses, 2.5 million real-time transactions every day and $40 billion in annual purchasing data, according to the SEC filing.
Following the IPO, Premier plans to restructure its business around 2 main functions: supply-chain purchasing and consulting.
