Mumbai: Medi-Clinic Corp. Ltd., South Africa''s third-largest hospital chain, will acquire private equity-owned Swiss peer Klinik Hirslanden AG for Sfr2.85 billion ($2.36 billion).

Stellenbosch, South Africa-based Medi-Clinic said the acquisition of Hirslanden would add 13 private hospitals and €600 million ($822 million) in annual revenue to the group.

Medi-Clinic plans to finance the acquisition mainly through a new loan from Barclays Bank plc and would sell 198.7 million new shares to raise at least 4.5 billion rand ($634 million) to pay for the remainder.

Besides South Africa, Medi-Clinic also operates hospitals in the United Arab Emirates.

"The company has made a strategic decision to diversify geographically within its core business of acute, specialist-orientated hospital care and to transform itself into a truly international hospital company," Medi-Clinic said in a statement.

BC Partners, which bought the hospital group in 2002 for Sfr930 million from UBS, have invested an additional Sfr400 million into the group and acquired the St. Anna Hospital in Lucerne, Switzerland.

The financial investors have thus netted Sfr1.5 billion in the transaction.

Financial investors traditionally only pony up about one-fifth of the total purchase price in equity and finance the rest.

Last year, BC partners sold its private hospital business British General Healthcare Group Ltd. to a consortium led by South Africa''s Network Healthcare Holdings Ltd. for £2.2 billion ($4.5 billion). BC Partners, in turn, had bought it from Cinven Partners Ltd. in 2000 for £1.275 billion.