Healthcare business to raise Rs409m via right issue

KARACHI: MetaTech Health Ltd is going to raise Rs408.8 million by offering perpetual and convertible Islamic bonds or sukuk to existing shareholders by way of a right issue.

The size of the right issue is 550 per cent of the company’s paid-up capital, which means shareholders will get the chance to own 550 right sukuk for every 100 ordinary shares they currently hold.

The sukuk, issued at Rs10 apiece, will be perpetual unless they get converted into ordinary shares in the case of pre-determined trigger events.

According to Aftab Ahmed Chaudhry, managing owner of MetaTech Health, it’s going to be the first-of-its-kind hybrid security or “custody receipt” to trade on the Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX). It’ll trade like a stock and get paid like a bond, he said.

That’s because the sukuk and the shares of the company will be traded through a “twin custody receipt” or TCR. For the issuance of the TCRs, the existing shares of the company will be handed over to a trustee. No separate trading in the share will then take place. Similarly, sukuk will also be handed over to the trustee and, as such, no separate trading in the Islamic instrument will take place.

Afterwards, the trustee will issue the TCRs while adjusting the total number and the price of the hybrid security as per the applicable regulations of the PSX. The hybrid security will then be traded on the exchange like any ordinary stock.

The profit rate will be decided by the company’s board of directors “over and above” the base rate of Re1 per sukuk every year.

MetaTech Health is in the healthcare technology business, including technology devices, medical care, diagnostics, pharmacies and pharmaceuticals.

It’s raising capital to develop and operationalise dental studios across the country and make an equity investment in Ensmile Ltd of up to Rs300 million.

Ensmile Ltd is a company that deals in invisible dental aligners, which are invisible and removable, require no change in diet/lifestyle and its results can be visualised before starting the treatment.

The technology is based on 3-D printing. The company is already exporting almost 100pc of its production to countries like Germany, Portugal, United Kingdom, Singapore, United Arab Emirates and Turkiye.

MetaTech Health will acquire a 33pc shareholding in Ensmile and handle its local business after developing Ensmile Dental Studios across Pakistan.