ACM clears merger between care providers Thebe and Ruitersbos

The Netherlands Authority for Consumers and Markets (ACM) has cleared the planned merger between care providers Thebe and Ruitersbos. Thebe is a care provider, predominantly active in the south of the Netherlands (more specifically the western and central parts of the province of North Brabant). Thebe offers nursing care, day activities, and district nursing, among other services. Ruitersbos is a care provider in the city of Breda (which lies in the western part of North Brabant). Ruitersbos offers nursing care and day activities, among other services.

ACM’s investigation has revealed that, after the planned concentration, the newly merged provider Thebe/Ruitersbos would be the largest provider of nursing care and day activities in the municipality of Breda. However, sufficient other care providers that are also active in these markets will remain in Breda. That is important because too strong a position of any one nursing care provider in a region can have negative consequences for clients. Such a nursing care provider would then be able, for example, to close down or combine certain locations, as a result of which vulnerable seniors and/or their loved ones are no longer able to choose the nursing home that meets their needs best.

Even a merged company with a strong position can ensure that locations are sufficiently different from one another. However, it is much more difficult to protect individuals against, for example, the closing down or combining of locations once a nursing care provider has a strong position.

Ruitersbos wishes to merge with Thebe in order to be able to safeguard the quality of care in the future too. Ruitersbos claims that, through the merger with Thebe, it is able to give a boost to the quality of care to clients by investing in health care technology, and it also claims that the merger can help realize the new residential facilities that Ruitersbos has planned, while safeguarding the positive aspects of Ruitersbos’s identity.

ACM’s merger control

Through its assessments of mergers and acquisitions in the health care sector, ACM contributes towards the affordability, accessibility, and quality of health care. In ACM’s assessments of mergers and acquisitions, the consequences for patients and insured are central. If patients, health insurers, and municipalities continue to have sufficient options after a merger or acquisition, it will help towards lower prices, higher quality, and more diversity and innovation in health care.