Challenges and Opportunities in Healthcare Private Equity

This year brings a number of global challenges as well as opportunities to the healthcare private equity sector. Kara Murphy, a partner with Bain's Healthcare and Private Equity practices, encourages investors to adopt proactive deal-making strategies in order to take advantage of the sector's opportunities for years to come.

Read the transcript below:

KARA MURPHY: As we look to 2020, there are some challenges to think through, but also tremendous opportunities for healthcare PE investing. First on the uncertainties and challenges front, there are both macro forces to think through, as well as micro competitive dynamics in terms of getting deals done. On the macro forces, a few things to highlight. One, what's going to happen to the economy; two, what's going to happen in the political election year; and, three, what's going to happen with the coronavirus.

Turning more towards the deal environment itself, it is an intensely competitive market. And so the bar is high for getting deals done and getting good deals done. Against that backdrop of challenges and opportunities, I would highlight there's a lot to be excited about. First of all, healthcare is a big segment, a recession-resistant sector, a sector where one has gotten differentially good deal returns, and there are a lot of segments in the early innings of their adoption and a real chance to bend the cost trend and deliver differentiated clinical outcomes for patients.

And so as we weigh both the opportunities and challenges, again, we're incredibly excited about the year ahead. And we'd just encourage investors to think really proactively and thoughtfully around what sectors, what assets and what differentiated value creation thesis to drive winning deal returns in this year and many years to come.

Read the Report

Global Healthcare Private Equity and Corporate M&A Report 2020

Investors remain eager to pour funds into healthcare, given strong underlying demand and the industry’s resilience at any stage of the economic cycle. Our annual report looks at recent trends and the outlook for healthcare investing.