Completing an investment in a health sector business during lockdown is no mean feat. Jason Sinclair looks at how WestBridge Capital – advised by KPMG – persevered through hard times to back the Bespoke Health & Social Care management buy-out, completed in June this year

As UK lockdown hit in March, Paul Sais, CEO of Bespoke Health & Social Care, had his hands full. He was supporting the NHS in freeing up hospital beds as patients with acute needs, but not affected by COVID-19, were discharged for home care. Nottingham-based Bespoke provides complex care to spinal, neurological and other patients who often require round-the-clock assistance.

At the same time, Sais was busy putting the final touches to a management buy-out (MBO), as private equity house WestBridge Capital was about to invest £9.6m to support the business’s future development.

The MBO completed in late June, and it shows that while lockdown changed the M&A perspectives, the process was intact.

Khush Purewal, KPMG’s head of corporate finance for the Midlands, marketed the sale: “In common with a lot of transactions over the last 12 months, we’ve had lots of dislocating issues – Brexit and its predicted impacts, the autumn Budget, the election, the expected change in capital gains tax – all of which meant changes in the deal timetable. After Sais got comfortable with what the tax changes meant for him, at that point the country was locking down.”

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Read the full article from the Corporate Financier September 2020 edition. Exclusively for Corporate Finance Faculty & Faculties Online members, you can access our award winning magazine in its originally designed form, and our extensive archive brought to you by the ICAEW Corporate Finance Faculty.