Mumbai-headquartered Metropolis Healthcare, a leading chain of diagnostics labs across India that sees itself as the second largest player in the country after the New Delhi-based Dr Lal PathLabs, is now readying itself to build and strengthen its presence across North India.
Speaking on the back of two acquisitions made in the North in a span of just about three months, Ameera Shah, promoter and executive chairperson, Metropolis Healthcare says, “both these acquisitions were very intentional. The idea is to build a string of pearls across north. When we entered North, we entered as a B2B player and while we have established a good brand with doctors and hospitals with good amount of speciality business from Delhi, Punjab and Haryana, we felt the next step would be to align with leaders across select geographies in the north. Enter and buy out a B2C brand leader in that market.”
The basic objective, she says, is to make deeper penetration in the north Indian states. “While Agra will be an ideal entry point and beachhead for western UP, we will keep looking for the right acquisition opportunities to again make entry points, create a hub and build from there,” she says.
Metropolis has eight labs and 80 collection centres across UP with three of them in Western UP. The rest of UP these are in locations like Lucknow, Prayagraj, Kanpur and Gorakhpur.
Explaining the rationale behind each of the two acquisitions, Shah says, “as for the previous acquisition of Core, it was built as a cancer-testing platform across India, Scientific Pathology (the acquisition in Agra that was announced on Monday, March 3rd) is built as a centre doing all kinds of testing in Agra. Therefore, the former is more for oncology-testing with an edge in terms of connect with oncologists whereas the latter is more of a geography play with its doctor connect in the region and as a leader in the local market that will now be scaled up.”
On the opportunities to grow beyond Agra and on the fact that there are growing linkages with Delhi in the diagnostics arena there, Ameera Shah says, “for the Western UP, while the connection with Delhi is strong, it is important to remember that healthcare is a very hyper-local market with people preferring testing done locally. Therefore, making Agra a testing hub would be the goal, which in turn, will also play a role in expanding the size of the local market there.”
This acquisition makes Metropolis the second largest player in Western UP after Dr Lal PathLabs.
On competition and the plans going forward, Ameera Shah does not see the entry as a one driven by having the company pitted against any other player. “We have just entered this market in a big way and will focus on strengthening it. We do see a big opportunity,” she says.
The aim now, she explains, is to make Agra the hub for western UP. Metropolis already has three labs in Western UP – Meerut, Bareilly and Saharanpur in addition to 80 collection centres that will all connect into Agra. “While we do basic testing in other labs, Agra will be the regional reference lab handling about 500 varieties of tests with the rest being handled out of Delhi and Mumbai. Metropolis overall undertakes 4000 varieties of tests,” she says.
On the financial calculation for the Agra acquisition, Ameera Shah says, “we are valuing the business there at Rs 65 crores at the moment and based on the June 2025 audited results and the resulting EBITDA, either we will pay up to Rs 83 crore or lesser than Rs 65 crore going down to Rs 55 crore. So, it is a range that we are looking at and linked to the performance of the company.
The deal is to give 90 per cent stake to Metropolis with the remaining 10 per cent still held by Dr Ashok Kumar Sharma, pathologist and founder of Scientific Pathology. They have three labs and 15 collection centres currently and a total turnover of Rs 26 crore as for FY24 and is described as a profitable business.
Ameera Shah is clear on the road ahead for the organisation and on the role of North India for Metropolis. “The financial year 2025-26 is very important for Metropolis because we are not only growing the fastest but also because with the two acquisitions in the North, we get to leap forward and see the contribution from North India increase from 8 per cent to nearly 15 per cent in 2025-26.”