Babylon Health UK operations on fire sale–buyers to be announced Friday 25 August (updated)

August 23, 2023 | by

Quickly and softly, softly, Babylon Health’s UK operations are being sold. The sale will include the proprietary tech stack. If you planned to bid, the deadline passed on Monday 21 August. Winning bids will be announced on Friday 25 August at the latest.  Update: As of 29 August, the bidders have not been announced.

The rush is due to the extreme position that Babylon Health’s operations are in. A UK shutdown is likely without a quick sale. Their UK business is with Bupa insurance, a little left with the NHS, some B2B, and GP At Hand/direct to consumer. Business consultancy Alvarez and Marsal are running the sale, presumably as part of the UK receivership.

Bidders, who were invited by letter, may include Bupa, Vitality, tech companies HealthHero and Cera–and even CEO Ali Parsa, which might lead to questions by customers or the court. Kry/Livi stated to press that they were not bidding. Customers Bupa, with a contract to 2025, and the NHS may have a say in the eventual deals.

The proceeds of the sale are projected not to exceed the $300 million debt owed to AlbaCore Capital nor its last $34.5 million tranche. Other debtors and vendors will be left in the proverbial lurch. Sifted.eu, Becker’s

The sale does not include the US operations that are included under the Chapter 7 liquidation which is still in the filing of documents stage. Babylon US, which generated most of Babylon’s revenue, has already shut down. Close to half its business was with Centene entities such as Ambetter and WellCare, which terminated their contracts on 8 August, the day after the collapse of the AlbaCore deal. The only operating part of Babylon is the Meritage Medical Network, a medical practice IPA. Next steps start tomorrow, Thursday 24 August, for documentation of its secured and unsecured debtors and summaries of assets and liabilities. Babylon’s creditors will meet on Tuesday 12 September.

The UK fire sale also does not include Babyl Rwanda, a semi-independent unit that is engaging with the Rwandan government to find a buyer. There is no further information available on other operations in India or other countries. 

Most recent coverage on Babylon in TTA: 23 August, 17 August, 10 August, 8 August

Babylon Health files for US Chapter 7 bankruptcy, winding down Babyl Rwanda and ending care for 2.8 million users (updated)

August 17, 2023 | by

When added to the UK receivership, it looks like total hull loss* for Babylon. Their US bankruptcy was just made public through a Forbes article (hat tip to HIStalk) that Babylon Health filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy with papers dated Wednesday 9 August. This is two days after shutting their Austin HQ and laying off 94 staffers. This confirms that the US company will be liquidated for the value of the assets, which will be sold through the court and the proceeds distributed to secured creditors. One wonders who will be lining up for the IP and other scraps.

Babylon Inc. and Babylon Healthcare Inc. are the two entities filing Chapter 7. There are hundreds of creditors, but as is typical in Chapter 7 bankruptcy, only the creditors secured by collateral will have some chance of being paid something on the dollar. AlbaCore Capital alone is owed $34.5 million from their recent bridge financing and an earlier $300 million in notes due 2026.

Katie Jennings, the writer, notes that Babylon has three other subsidiaries incorporated in Delaware, none of which filed for bankruptcy. In the filings, Babylon’s assets and liabilities are listed as between $100 and $500 million. She attempted to reach their chief operating officer Paul-Henri Ferrand, the signature on the Chapter 7 filing, but his email bounced. (The COO position was eliminated per the Texas Workforce Commission notice.)

Next steps according to the article in the filing: next Thursday 24 August to document its secured and unsecured debtors and summaries of assets and liabilities. Babylon’s creditors will meet on Tuesday 12 September. Bankruptcy documents are on Pacer and on Inforuptcy (fees required)

Update 18 August: The Healthcare Dive article published today has links to both Babylon Inc. and Babylon Healthcare bankruptcy filings. The precipitating act was that Centene first notified Babylon Healthcare on contract non-renewal on 4 August. On 8 August, after the AlbaCore deal collapsed the prior day, Centene terminated all contracts with Babylon effective immediately, save three contracts with Babylon’s IPA, Meritage Medical Network. The Centene contracts constituted over 48% of their US business in 2022. 8 August SEC Form 8-K

In Rwanda, Babylon Health through its Babyl unit is also winding down virtual care that covers 20% of the country. Babylon has a 10-year agreement with the government of Rwanda to provide virtual primary care services to people in that country, subsidized by $2.2 million in funding from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation in a partnership dating back to 2016. By the end of 2022, Babyl reported 2.8 million users, or 20% of that 13.2 million person country, claiming a daily 4,000 medical consults a day, which constitutes an outstanding success by the numbers. But that won’t be preserved in the parent company collapse.

A Monday 7 August email obtained by Forbes states that Babylon will be winding down operations there on a non-disclosed timetable and without a clear path for its 650 employees there. “It is with a heavy heart that we will begin the process of winding down Babyl Rwanda, while in parallel exploring opportunities to find Babyl Rwanda a new home. We have entered into discussions with potential investors and partners and will leave no stone unturned to secure the best possible outcome for our business and Babylonians.” (sic) Regarding layoffs, the email confirmed most of the US layoffs would be immediate, UK employees would largely be retained, and Rwanda and India workers would be told more at team meetings. Employees were warned not to talk to the press and the email was signed ‘Babylon Leadership’.  The Gates Foundation did not comment on whether the foundation had been informed of Babylon’s plans to wind down service.

Previous TTA coverage back to May:

Babylon Health shuts US operations, goes into UK receivership, Babylon merger with AlbaCore and MindMaze collapses, selling UK and transitioning US businesses, bankruptcy anticipated, Babylon Health to go private with AlbaCore in planned ‘Take Private Proposal’, combine with MindMaze, Babylon Health to go private (includes summary of Q1 financials)

This story is developing. *’Hull loss’ describes an aviation accident that results in catastrophic, unrecoverable damage to the aircraft.

HealthSpot winds out to Ch. 7 liquidation, assets for sale

March 11, 2016 | by

The object lesson of HealthSpot continued its sad revelations in a Columbus, Ohio Federal bankruptcy court Thursday (10 March) with the confirmation of liquidation under Chapter 7 rather than reorganization under Chapter 11. According to the report in MedCityNews, the bankruptcy trustee is now accepting offers for the assets valued by HealthSpot at $5.1 million. The bulk of these assets–$3.5 million–consist of 191 telemedicine kiosks of which 54 had been deployed with customers such as Rite Aid and Cleveland Clinic. The trustee has been permitted by the court to list these assets on a website. Whether there is any market for the hardware, or the intellectual property of HealthSpot, is a very open question indeed.

Some digging by this Editor has revealed a possible precipitating event to the company’s shutdown, and an obvious, non-recoupable drain on the time and funds of a teetering company. A District Court order issued 4 December on the patent infringement legal action by Nevada-based Computerized Screening [TTA 8 Jan] is now available online. It appears to have been conceded by Computerized Screening as “non-infringement on the basis of the absence of the limitation of “controller”” which is technically a win for HealthSpot. But HealthSpot then sought in September to collect attorney’s fees of a stunning $829,500 from Computerized Screening (more…)

HealthSpot files for Chapter 7 liquidation (updated)

January 19, 2016 | by

The shock continues with HealthSpot. On Wednesday the company filed for Chapter 7 liquidation in US Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of Ohio in Columbus. The laundry list: assets of $5.2 million, about $3.5 million in inventory, and $23.3 million in liabilities, including convertible notes of $10 million from cable/broadband company Cox Communications, $6 million from investor Xerox and an undisclosed amount from the Ohio Development Services Agency. HealthSpot had raised close to $44 million since 2011. Their bankruptcy attorney David Whittaker cited cash flow; with only $1.1 million in revenue over the past three years, according to the filing, including $600,000 in 2015, no elaboration was needed. There’s not much left in assets to sell: 191 kiosks, mostly in storage (137) and 54 operating but shuttered at customer sites. The remaining value in liquidation (a/k/a pennies on the dollar) is dependent on whether the name, the kiosks and the IP are purchased. The last is problematic due to the current legal action by Computerized Screening [TTA 8 Jan] We hope this is not a sad harbinger of digital health in 2016, though we have already sensed that the unicorns are heading Over The Rainbow or wherever they go to pasture, but it’s not reassuring. Columbus Business First, MedCityNews.

Update: Neil Versel in his Throwback Thursday took a look at HealthSpot’s steak and salad days at International CES 2013. (See comments for this Editor’s impressions of HealthSpot at ATA 2014.) Perhaps good marketing, but symptomatic of the capital burn, doomed by a lack of sales and quite possibly, a solution that would have knocked it out of the park in 2010. As the old fighter pilot said, ‘timing and luck are everything.’