Inside Our Playbook: How We Build Value in Healthcare Businesses

Most people think private equity is all about the numbers. Buy low, sell high, rinse, repeat.

At Ara Capital, we think a little differently.

Yes, numbers matter — but in healthcare, they don’t tell the whole story. You can’t spreadsheet your way into better patient care or motivated doctors. You have to understand the business of healing people.

That’s where our playbook comes in.

1. Start with the founder

We back clinician-entrepreneurs — surgeons, dentists, doctors, and therapists who’ve built something good and want help making it great. They often wear ten hats a day: seeing patients, managing teams, fixing the internet router.

We help them focus on what they do best — care — while we handle the rest:

• Hiring and training

• Finance and compliance

• Branding and marketing

• Tech upgrades

Think of us as the COO they always needed — with capital and a game plan.

2. Fix what’s broken

In every deal, we go deep. Site visits, audits, HR interviews, process mapping — we know what to look for. Leaky margins? Underutilised chairs? Inefficient rostering? We’ve seen it all.

But we don’t just spot problems. We solve them:

• Automating inventory and scheduling

• Consolidating suppliers to get better prices

• Digitising paper records

• Reconfiguring floor plans to increase capacity

Our goal? Make the business run smoother and smarter.

3. Build the brand

You’d be amazed how many healthcare businesses don’t have a proper brand. No website. No call tracking. No CRM. Sometimes not even a logo that works on a mobile screen.

We change that — fast.

Because a strong brand builds trust, attracts talent, and commands pricing power. Whether it’s dental aesthetics in Singapore or cosmetic surgery in the UAE, a clear brand promise makes the difference between a good clinic and a great group.

4. Scale responsibly

We’re not here to blow up headcount or open five branches overnight. Scale without soul is a shortcut to burnout — for staff and patients alike.

Instead, we scale with intent:

• Measured hiring

• Sensible expansion

• Keeping clinician culture alive

• Always putting patient experience first

Growth for us means more people helped, more jobs created, and a stronger, more resilient business.

5. Prepare for exit from day one

Whether it’s a future IPO, a strategic buyer, or a management buyout — we build with the end in mind.

That means:

• Clean books and clear governance

• Management depth beyond the founder

• Recurring revenue, not one-off wins

• A vision that someone else will want to inherit

Because exits aren’t events. They’re earned over years of careful building.

The Ara Difference

Anyone can write a cheque. But very few can build alongside the founder — in the trenches, not just the boardroom.

That’s what we do at Ara Capital. That’s why our partners stay with us. And that’s why the companies we back don’t just grow — they thrive.