Medicover to build two hospitals, one regional lab and clinics

Swedish group Medicover, one of the leading players on the private medical services market has come to its “Romanian stage” of development, after investing 200 million euros in Poland, and will allocate around 70-80 million euros to build a sizeable, 200-bed general care hospital in Pipera, a smaller facility specialising in births and orthopaedics in northern Bucharest, and a Synevo regional lab, also in Bucharest.
The investment in the hospital alone amounts to 50 million euros. Work on the general care hospital will start in February next year and have 2013 as a completion deadline, “when the economy steps out of recession”, being the biggest investment announced in a hospital in Romania.
“It’s not that simple. You have to do your homework very well before starting to build a hospital,” says Fredrik Ragmark, CEO of Medicover, answering a question about the significant amount of time allocated for the works.
Over the last few years Medicover has been a rather discreet presence, but, after the major expansion that occurred prior to 2006-2007, plans have been extremely cautious. In 2007 the company was the third to announce plans for a private hospital, before the hospital “frenzy” came over the industry. At the time the operational hospitals were Euroclinic and MedLife.
Only recently have the remaining players announced plans to build hospitals, turning the private medical market into the most sought after sector for investments.