International expansion within the healthcare services sector is happening at speed. The last month has seen Spanish hospital group Hospiten announce its acquisition of five hospitals on the Mexican pacific coast from Amerimed, Ramsay announce a joint venture in China and Interhealth Canada get the go-ahead for the first operator-led PPP in Eastern Europe at Zywiec in Poland. But all of this is to look at internationalisation through a Western prism.

In fact, we are constantly uncovering non-European groups who are active internationally outside Europe.  Here are just two interesting examples from the lab sector.  Indian lab group Metropolis Healthcare has entered Sri Lanka, UAE, South Africa, Kenya, Mauritius and Ghana. Or take Labnet Global, which now covers Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and the Ukraine, with interests in Vietnam.

Within Europe, the healthcare services sector is slowly making the move from being family-run by doctors to an industry run by professional managers. Don’t assume that slow and comfortable pace of change applies in the developing world. There are plenty of large, well-financed outfits run by people who think and talk like American Business MBAs. That’s because, frequently, they are! We’re starting to cover this development at Healthcare Europa 2015 on April 28 in London.