File picture: Leon Nicholas File picture: Leon Nicholas
Johannesburg - Clicks Group’s bid to take over almost 90 Netcare outlets has been given the green light by the Competition Tribunal, but not without conditions.
When announcing the deal in June, the companies jointly said the long-term agreement would see Clicks handling the operations of 37 retail pharmacies in Medicross family medical and dental centres, as well as 51 hospital retail front shop operations.
This will see Clicks taking control of all Medicross pharmacies and the front shops of the Netcare Hospital division. The deal, however, excludes dispensing of prescriptions in the Netcare Hospital pharmacies, which will remain under Netcare’s hospital operations.
Clicks and Netcare said the agreement would allow them to offer an enhanced retail service offering to patients and consumers by affiliating the pharmacy and the front shops to “an experienced retail provider such as Clicks”.
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Clicks CEO David Kneale says the deal will extend Clicks' retail pharmacy presence. “We will be rebranding the Medicross pharmacies and Netcare front shops to Clicks."
On Thursday evening, the tribunal said the deal could go ahead, as long as 183 Medicross employees and 24 Netcare employees will transfer from Netcare to Clicks Retailers. The merger is likely to also see the employment of more than 60 additional employees.
The Competition Commission had requested a 5-year moratorium on retrenchment.
In the parties’ June announcement, they said specific employees involved in the affected areas of the business will be transferred to Clicks on terms similar to their current conditions of employment and any other employees indirectly affected will remain employed by Netcare on their current conditions of employment.
Netcare CEO Richard Friedland has said there will be no loss of jobs.
In the year to August, Clicks reported turnover up 9.5 percent to R24.2 billion, while net profit grew by 14.6 percent to R1 billion.
In the 6 months to March, Netcare reported revenue up 15.4 percent R18.8 billion, while net profit gained 20.7 percent to R1.3 billion.
IOL