GE Provides $160M Credit Facility in Odyssey HealthCare Purchase of VistaCare

Odyssey HealthCare Inc. has received a $160 million senior secured credit facility from GE Healthcare Financial Services in connection with Odyssey’s acquisition, finalized last week, of VistaCare Inc. With its acquisition of VistaCare, Odyssey is now one of the nation’s two largest providers of hospice care, Dirk Allison, Odyssey’s CFO, told CPN. The company owns or operates approximately 110 Medicare-certified hospice care locations in 30 states totaling an average daily census of more than 12,000 patients. Before the acquisition, Allison said, Odyssey had annualized revenues in the $410 million to $420 million range, and VistaCare’s revenues were in the area of $230 million to $240 million. For the time being, he told CPN, all sites will continue to operate under their current names. A decision will be made next year whether to keep that status quo or adopt one name or the other, either overall or in specific overlapping markets. The acquisition, first announced in mid-January, was valued at $8.60 a share, or a total of approximately $148 million. In a statement issued at that time, Odyssey said that it intended to fund the transaction “with $30 million of its own cash and a funded commitment of $150 million from GE Capital, consisting of a five-year $30 million revolving credit facility and a six-year $120 million term loan.” The two-step acquisition was pursuant to a “short-form merger” under Delaware law. Odyssey made a cash tender offer for all outstanding shares of VistaCare common stock, followed by a cash merger in which Odyssey acquired the remaining outstanding shares.