Nexxus Iberia invests in Vivo Diagnostico, and independent diagnostic imaging service provider in Spain

The third investment by Nexxus Iberia Private Equity Fund II (‘Fund 2”) involves the majority acquisition from its original founder and management team, who will reinvest in the project and will continue leading the company

Nexxus Iberia, a Spanish Private Equity firm with c. €500m AuM, has finalised the acquisition of a majority stake in Vivo Diagnostico, company dedicated mainly to diagnostic imaging services and genetic analysis. The business, which generated over €20 million in revenue in 2023 is focused on a network of company-owned clinics in Andalusia, Madrid, and Aragón, accounting for over half of its operations. It also provides services throughout the rest of Spain and Portugal via mobile diagnostic imaging, outsourcing services to hospitals, PET/CT[1] diagnostics, teleradiology services and a genetic laboratory.

The company has established itself as a leading independent platform in Spain with preventive care and wellbeing of its patients at the core of its business purpose. Vivo has developed a company based on innovation, science, people and simplicity to provide integrated diagnostic services. The group employs more than 200 professionals, performs + 400.000 tests annually and counts with a network of more than 100 specialized doctors.

Vivo is the result of the integration of several independent clinics. The team at Vivo Diagnostico has a strong track record in the industry and in integrating and growing businesses. In this journey, the company has developed a solid value-for-money positioning and excellence in operation and innovation.

The company benefits from an expanding diagnostic services market in Spain backed by strong underlying fundamentals including ageing demographics, increasing treatment rates, increasing waiting lines and the need of public administrations to outsource services to specialized providers.

In this new phase and with the financial support of Nexxus Iberia, the company will focus on its inorganic expansion while continues to invest in innovation, services quality and efficiency.

This transaction represents another successful partnership between Nexxus Iberia and a top-level management team. Oscar Brihuega, founder and current CEO will remain as a reference minority shareholder and with and active execution role. Maite and Alex, Founding Partners of Nexxus Iberia, commented, “Healthcare is one of our preferred verticals at Nexxus and Vivo gathers what we seek in our investments: ambitious management teams, markets with long-term trends and opportunities to add value from our side in terms of inorganic growth and digitalization.”

Oscar Brihuega, General Manager of Vivo, states, “Since its inception Vivo has always stood out for being at the forefront of diagnostic services: we have been the pioneers in high-tech mobile units and we were also the first to offer saliva PCR techniques at home at the worst moment of the pandemic. We have always combined the technical and personal excellence of all our healthcare professionals with the most innovative and disruptive ideas. And that is why I have found the perfect partner in Nexxus, not only because they support us with their financial solvency, but because they support the ambitious pipeline of innovation projects in preventive diagnosis that we have. For me, in fact, it is like going back to my time as a doctoral student at Cambridge, when the sky was the limit and I dreamed of disrupting diagnosis to avoid having patients: diagnosing the greatest number of pathologies early”.

Vivo Diagnóstico is the third investment of the recently launched Fund 2, which has total commitments of €241 million. For Nexxus as a whole, this marks the fifteenth investment, including those made from its first fund, Nexxus Private Equity Fund I, and OFG Continuation Fund. The investment capitalised the fund knowledge in healthcare and complements its current portfolio of its second fund which includes Contenur and Marsanz. Nexxus Iberia was advised on the transaction by Pinsent Masons (legal, tax, labour), Deloitte (financial due diligence), LEK (commercial due diligence), EY (ESG due diligence), Aon (insurance), while Ramon y Cajal (legal), Socios Financieros (M&A) advised the sellers.  

[1] PET/CT stands for combined Positron Emission Tomography and Computerised Tomography, widely used in oncology and in neuropsychiatric diseases