Telstra Health to buy MedicalDirector for $350m

Telstra Health will buy general practice management software maker MedicalDirector for $350 million.

The telco’s health arm is buying MedicalDirector from private equity firm Affinity Equity Partners, which paid $117 million for it in March 2016.

Board chair Brendon Riley said the purchase reflects Telstra Health’s “maturity as a business” and its ambitions to be a global player, given MedicalDirector also has a presence in the UK.

“GPs play a central role in connecting to every part of the health and aged care systems, and practice management is an incredibly important addition for Telstra Health in providing quality solutions and supporting them to deliver care,” Riley said in a statement.

MedicalDirector’s software-as-a-service platform supports approximately 23,000 medical practitioners in Australia and is used to deliver more than 80 million consultations a year, according to Telstra Health.

The platform is useful in providing a “continuum of care” as patients “move back and forth across home, clinics, hospitals, aged-care and pharmacies,” Telstra Health’s managing director, Professor Mary Foley added.

The transaction is expected to be completed in the first quarter of FY22.

Rumours of the purchase have been circling since at least late last year, and resurfaced again a month ago.