Ann: Change in substantial holding, page-3

Interesting growth play:

Carrie LaFrenz AFR
Primary Health Care has hired the son-in-law of the former Philippine president Gloria Macapagal Arroyo as country manager for its specialist diagnostic services subsidiary as it aims to gain a foothold in south-east Asia.
John Aloysius Bernas, known to friends as Luigi, joined Primary's subsidiary SDS Pathology in February. Mr Bernas has held senior roles at Bear Stearns (now Deutsche Bank) and at Bankers Trust (now JPMorgan Chase) over several decades.
Mr Bernas married the daughter of 14th Philippine president Arroyo in 2008 and is highly connected in his native Philippines where he has served as director of the Philippine Stock Exchange and the Securities Clearing Corporation of the Philippines.
Several sources said pathology division boss Wes Lawrence has been spending a lot of time in the Philippines sparking speculation that a joint-venture deal with high-profile St Luke's Medical Centre in Manila was well progressed.

Primary suffered a blow to its Asian growth strategy last year when talks with possible joint-venture partner, Indonesia's Astra International, fell apart.


Mr Bernas, who did not return calls from The Australian Financial Review, is also an adviser to several private companies including micro-lender LeapFrog Investments.
Project LeapFrog also happens to be the name of the new strategic initiative Primary chief executive Malcolm Parmenter outlined at the company's half-year results in February.

LeapFrog aims to revamp the 70-odd medical centres business by offering more services and driving operational efficiencies through digitisation. It's a multi-year overhaul of the operating model allowing GPs to build their practice through an appointment system, which will pave the way for selected private billing. Primary's model has traditionally been walk-in and bulk billed.
Dr Parmenter said it would be premature to talk about the cost of LeapFrog, but was confident about the transformation of the medical centre business.
"We have been through about 20 medical centres now meeting with regional mangers and doctors," he said. "What we saw previously was medical centres being treated as one large business. It's in fact 70 or more individual businesses, that operate in the community with different needs.This is about delivering a local business plan."

Dr Parmenter, who took the top job in September, said he was "pretty confident" about where it could take the medical centre business.
While its earnings in pathology and imaging were up in the first half of 2018, the medical centres' earnings tumbled 18.6 per cent.
In February Dr Parmenter said it would be another 12 to 18 months before the strategy and doctor recruitment outcomes would be visible, although he confirmed doctor recruitment would be better this second half.
He previously talked up his commitment to growing the medical centre division, as well as smaller but well-performing imaging division Healthcare Imaging Services.

"There has clearly been a lot of activity in imaging," he said. " At this point we are committed to that business and it's integral to our medical centre business, and honestly we have not made any decision there. It's growing strongly, and imaging offers great opportunity overseas."
Several industry sources said bidders who missed out on I-Med assets might like to buy Primary's imaging, which partners with 112 independent radiologists and operates a network of 142 sites. The unit grew revenue 10.1 per cent in the first half while earnings before interest and tax increased 14.7 per cent. It also purchased Brisbane Private Imaging in December.


Read more: http://www.afr.com/business/health/hospitals-and-gps/primary-health-care-hires-soninlaw-of-exphilippine-president-20180308-h0x7hz#ixzz59CIcC992
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