Here is a link to the story from Forbes. Not much detail here as the terms were not disclosed. Arcadian has about 64,000 HMO members and the acquisition will not materially impact Humana’s financials. The deal is subject to regulatory approval. The pace of acquisitions has been fairly rapid in the Medicare Advantage and Part D space with HealthSpring closing on Bravo late this year, CVS-Caremark closing on the Part D business of Universal American earlier this year and Wellpoint recently closing on CareMore.
I don’t see any reason not to expect a few more deals before the end of this year.
[...] in the Medicare advantage market have completed sizable deals in 2011 including UnitedHealth, Humana, WellPoint and Cigna. The only major player who is yet to make an acquisition is Aetna (but there [...]
I was in a HUmana certification calss today and the trainer said that he estimates there within 3 years there will be no more than 4 players nationwide.
These privately-held plans must either be IPO opportunities or else the investors and venture capital backers will push these smaller MA players into the arms of the larger publicly held companies as part of their exit strategies.
It seems the big players are swallowing up all the small fish. Probably in a few years the only companies left in MA will be UHC, Coventry, Highmark, Aetna, Cigna, and Humana. I think its better with more competition. I don’t like seeing all the smaller companies acquired by large behemoths.