Recently, Cardinal Health, the world's ninth largest medical device company, announced that it has signed a final agreement to acquire Integrated Oncology Network (ION) for $1.115 billion (approximately RMB 7.861 billion) in cash to expand its oncology services business.

INO is an independent community cancer center operator with over 50 clinics, more than 100 suppliers, and over 1000 healthcare workers in 10 states across the United States. It provides comprehensive care services for communities in areas such as medical oncology, radiation oncology, urology, and diagnostic testing.

After this acquisition, all assets of ION will be integrated into the Navista Cancer Care division of Gardenor, and ION's clinics will also receive Navista's artificial intelligence analysis capabilities, as well as PPS Analytics platform support previously acquired by Gardenor through the acquisition of Specialty Networks.

Navista is a subsidiary of Gardenor, a cancer diagnosis and treatment department jointly established with oncologists and clinic leaders, providing advanced support services and technology. Its goal is to help healthcare providers optimize operations, improve patient care quality, and reduce costs by integrating advanced technology, data analysis, and management tools.

Morgan Stanley analyst Lisa Gill said, "Since the unveiling of Navista in 2023, Gardner has been discussing expanding its collaboration with community practices, and we believe today's acquisition is a positive step in this direction for the oncology field

01. Two acquisitions in three years, targeting the field of oncology services
As one of the major pharmaceutical supply chain operators in the United States, Gardiner has been expanding its professional nursing services in recent years and competing with its peers.

Last month, its competitor McKesson announced the acquisition of a controlling stake in a division of the Florida Cancer Specialist and Research Institute for nearly $2.5 billion, while drug distributor Cencora also acquired a minority stake in cancer care provider OneOncology with TPG this spring, with a transaction valuation of approximately $2.1 billion.

At the same time, Jia De Nuo also has frequent movements. At the beginning of this year, Jiadeno acquired Specialty Networks for $1.2 billion in cash to expand its product services in the field of professional therapy and enhance its analytical capabilities and services for downstream healthcare service providers. It is reported that Specialty Networks' PPS analysis platform can analyze data from electronic medical records, practice management, imaging, and drug distribution systems, which will effectively supplement Jiadeno's distribution, research, and technical capabilities.

As early as 2021, Specialty Networks also launched Navista Tech Solutions (TS), a technology solution tailored for oncology clinics, to help oncology practices improve patient care, reduce costs, and drive the success of value based care. Navista TS consists of multiple technical solutions, including:
 Episode Analytics: This is a data-driven cost tracking tool developed by Fuse, the innovation department of Jiadeno. Intended to assist oncologists and administrators in accurately measuring medical costs at the beginning and throughout the entire treatment process, providing a basis for value oriented treatment decisions.
 CureMD Oncology Cloud: This integrated platform includes electronic health records (EHR), practice management system (PMS), revenue cycle management (RCM) services, patient portal, and remote healthcare solutions. Intended to simplify decision-making, improve operational efficiency, and provide support for medical institutions to smoothly transition to value oriented healthcare.
 CORE Group Health Decision Support System: This is an AI tool developed by Jvion that can help oncologists identify high-risk patients in advance and provide intervention recommendations, avoiding expensive emergency and hospitalization treatments.
 VIPER Clinical Trial Matching System: Developed by Deep Lens, VIPER is able to identify cancer patients faster and more efficiently through AI and match them with clinical trials, including precision medicine research. Jiadeno collaborates with Deep Lens to bring this technology into community oncology practice.

02. Breaking through industry difficulties
This acquisition of INO is another important layout of Jiadeno in the field of tumor care.

According to the data, INO was founded in 2002 and focuses on providing complete cancer care services to patients. The company collaborates with doctors, hospitals, and other medical institutions to provide comprehensive nursing services such as medical oncology, radiation oncology, urology, and diagnostic testing. The core mission of the company is to assist doctors in maintaining clinical autonomy while providing high-quality patient care. Committed to ensuring that community doctors can focus on patient care through technical support, resource optimization, and reducing administrative burden.

In addition, ION is driving the continuous development of community care models through innovative growth strategies and operational support to adapt to complex medical environments. The flexible operating model covers various services such as revenue cycle management, doctor recruitment, and clinic marketing, and can provide customized support according to the specific needs of member clinics; Operational data analysis and financial management support comprehensive care and sustained market growth.

After joining Jiadeno, INO will also receive support in advanced analytics, artificial intelligence technology, and other clinic management tools. Correspondingly, Jiadeno's Navista platform will also be further expanded.

Jason Hollar, CEO of Jia De Nuo, said, "Driving growth in the professional nursing field has always been our top priority. Through the acquisitions of Navista and Specialty Networks, we have expanded our service offerings, and ION's successful model in community oncology care will help us further accelerate the implementation of our oncology strategy and enhance the value for healthcare providers and patients.

ION CEO Barry Tanner said in a statement, "We share a common mission with Gardenor to help community oncology clinics provide world-class care experiences for patients and their families. This collaboration will provide community clinics with enhanced technology and tools to help them improve service quality and enhance patient treatment outcomes.

03. Food giant 'elephant turns around'
Jiadeno's business scope is very broad, with a presence in areas such as cardiovascular and surgical consumables, in addition to tumor care.

In 2020, driven by the pandemic, Jiadeno became one of the world's largest suppliers of medical gloves. But who would have thought that this company was originally a food giant.

It is understood that Cardinal was founded in 1971 as Cardinal Foods, a food distribution company. At that time, there was a wave of food movement in the United States. With the overall optimism of the industry, Cardinal Food continuously acquired and expanded its scale, seized market share, and successfully went public in 1983.

In the 1980s, the pharmaceutical industry grew rapidly. In the view of the insightful founder Walter, drugs and food have commonalities: they are both essential goods, and they have similar sales methods and warehousing processes. Walter decided to shift to the better performing medical industry and expand drug sales business on the basis of Cardinal Food.

In 1988, Walter completely withdrew from the food business and fully invested in the pharmaceutical sales industry. Taking advantage of industry mergers and acquisitions, Walter led the company to rapidly expand its territory.

In 1994, the group changed its name to Cardinal Health. In 1995, it acquired Medicine Shoppe, the largest retail pharmacy in the United States, which mainly deals in prescription drugs and is known for providing unique services such as health checkups and care centers.

This is also the first acquisition of Jiadeno's non-medical wholesale category, which has connected the upstream and downstream pharmaceutical sales industry chain. Since then, Jiadeno has maintained a high growth trend, with an average annual growth rate of 42% in revenue, and has become a leader in the medical and health services industry. Subsequently, we continuously increased our services such as health check ups and nursing centers, transforming Jiadeno from a drug distributor to a medical service group.

After 2015, Jiadeno, which had tasted the sweetness, continued to transform and began to increase its medical product business. In 2015, it spent $1.944 billion to acquire Cordis, the cardiovascular business of Johnson&Johnson Medical. In April 2017, it acquired Medtronic's medical supplies sales business for $6 billion, further laying the foundation for its transformation towards medical products and services.

In 2019, according to data statistics, Jia De Nuo announced the acquisition of the digital communication platform MSCcripts, which is associated with pharmacy dispensing systems, and reached 39 acquisition transactions since its establishment.

Currently, Jia De Nuo provides medical products to over 75% of hospitals in the United States, making it the largest drug sales network in the country. In addition, we also produce medical and surgical products, including gloves, surgical gowns, and fluid management products, providing customized solutions for hospitals, healthcare systems, pharmacies, outpatient surgical centers, clinical laboratories, and global doctor offices worldwide.
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After leaving the food industry, Jiadeno's main businesses are pharmaceuticals and medical products. These two major businesses generated $226.8 billion in revenue for it in the first half of 2024. Compared to last year's $205 billion, the growth rate has reached 11%.
Among them, the pharmaceutical business has an annual revenue of 210 billion US dollars, accounting for 93% of the total revenue; Profit of 2 billion US dollars, a year-on-year increase of 7%.

The medical product department achieved a revenue of 12.4 billion US dollars, accounting for approximately 5%; Profit of 92 million US dollars, a year-on-year decrease of 34%.

Source: http://qixieke.com/Font/index/detailPage.html?id=3199-142