Agathos backs management buy-out of Hunter Healthcare

Agathos is pleased to announce that we are backing the management buy-out of Hunter Healthcare (‘Hunter’), a fast-growing healthcare recruitment business.

Hunter is a London-headquartered, specialist healthcare recruitment business that places interim and permanent candidates into roles in the NHS, private healthcare and life science sectors. Hunter is known for its niche sector focus, high calibre candidates, depth of market knowledge, and the strength of its relationships with clients.

Hunter has developed an exceptional position in healthcare recruitment for non-clinical roles, with revenues growing to £44m in the current financial year. The business has a vision to be the global recruitment partner of choice to healthcare organisations. It is well positioned to serve its rapidly evolving healthcare and life science markets, including supporting the NHS with its reorganisation of Integrated Care Systems, the elective care backlog and the continued shift towards digitalisation.

Agathos’s investment will facilitate the management buy-out of Hunter Healthcare and support the senior leadership team in delivering ambitious growth plans. Internationally, Hunter has started serving the diagnostic and medical devices sector in the USA and plans on building its footprint in these fast-growing market segments over the months ahead.

Charles Oakshett, Partner at Agathos, commented:

“We are delighted to be partnering with Ben, Damian and the team at Hunter. The business has consistently delivered an excellent service to clients seeking to attract the best talent in the market, and as a result has achieved rapid growth. We see an opportunity for Hunter to build its core business with its existing clients and candidates whilst also breaking into new, growing markets.”

Ben James, CEO at Hunter, commented:

“We were in a fortunate position to have choice in who our private-equity partner could be, and it was clear early on that Agathos’s values, business ethics, operational experience and their genuine interest in our needs set them apart. We have worked incredibly hard to build Hunter to the business it has become, and we are hugely excited about what our exceptional team can deliver over the coming years as we pursue continued domestic and international growth along with personal choice for our employees and shareholders. We’re delighted to be joining forces with Charles, Will and the wider Agathos team.”

Agathos was advised by Stephenson Harwood (legal), Grant Thornton (debt advisory, strategic advice & modelling), BDO (tax structuring), HMT (financial and tax DD), Armstrong (commercial DD), Continuum (management DD), and WA Communications (policy DD). Hunter was advised by Harrison Clark Rickerby (sell-side legal) and Ed Groome of Quercus Corporate Finance (sell-side M&A).

This is Agathos’s ninth investment, and the first investment from Fund II, launched at the start of 2021. The fund invests £3-10m equity in UK SMEs with strong growth characteristics.