Autumn 2018 Issue
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Riadh Zine’s Entrepreneurial Journey in Diagnostic Imaging
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n under four years, Riadh Zine took Akumin from a turnaround story of a debtburden small player of 14 freestanding outpatient diagnostic imaging centres in the state of Florida with $25 million in revenues to the industry’s third largest U.S. player with 90 centres in six states generating $175 million in revenues, while bringing together a new leadership team and attracting the support of a broad base of retail and institutional shareholders. In late 2013, Zine founded Akumin Inc. to make an investment in the U.S. freestanding outpatient diagnostic imaging industry. The industry had already experienced the types of challenges he had seen in multiple other industries which ultimately resulted in consolidation within such industries. Those challenges typically include significant pricing cuts, regulatory burden, under-capitalised and inefficient small operators in a highly fragmented industry. “What made the consolidation opportunity in this challenging industry more attractive to me was that hospitals provided the only alternative for this essential diagnostic imaging service at much higher fees than the non-hospital facilities. The significant reimbursement cuts for more than a decade left this $25 billion industry with more than 6,500 imaging centres ripe for consolidation”, Zine explains. In late 2014, Akumin consummated an acquisition of 14 debt-burden centres in the state of Florida and Zine became its president & chief executive officer. Over the next four years, Akumin significantly grew its operations through both organic and acquisition growth. In December 2017, Zine also took Akumin public on the Toronto Stock Exchange to increase the profile of the company and to create an acquisition currency for future growth. The shares trade in both US$ and C$ currencies under the following symbols: TSX: AKU.U (US$) / AKU (C$). Also, in August 2018, Akumin entered a new credit facility with five major banks to further support its growth strategy. Zine goes on to say,“I am confident Akumin has a promising future to become the leading provider in the industry in the United States. Akumin’s success will be driven by a clearly defined strategy of building density as a pure-play diagnostic imaging provider in its key markets. However, I believe that the key ingredient to the ultimate success of any consolidation strategy is the operational integration of all the acquisitions into one efficient operation with one information
CEO: Riadh Zine
technology infrastructure, one set of systems, one set of operating procedures, one marketing approach, and ultimately one culture. From my experience, most companies that grow through a series of acquisitions crash because of failures in operational integration.” Before starting his entrepreneurial journey in 2013, Zine was a Managing Director in Global Investment Banking at RBC Capital Markets, where he was responsible for providing strategic and financial advice to many of Canada’s largest corporations, entrepreneurs and private equity firms. He has over 13 years of experience executing public or private equity and debt financings, as well as mergers & acquisitions for a wide range of companies. Prior to joining RBC Capital Markets, Zine began his career at Royal Bank of Canada in Toronto where he worked from 1997 to 1999 on several strategic projects, including the proposed merger between Royal Bank of Canada and Bank of Montreal. He earned a M.Sc. in financial CFI.co | Capital Finance International
engineering from University of Montreal (Ecole des Hautes Études Commerciales) in 1996 and received a scholarship from the Canadian Government to continue his graduate studies in 1994. Zine is also the co-founder of Roadmap Capital Inc., a technology venture capital firm with approximately $150 million in current assets under management. Formed in 2013, Roadmap Capital offers high net worth individuals and family offices the opportunity to co-invest, alongside Roadmap funds, in innovative leadingedge private companies. Roadmap Capital invests in hardware and semiconductor companies with disruptive technologies. Recently, Roadmap Capital has attracted significant strategic investments from NASDAQ listed industry leaders to its portfolio of companies. Finally, Zine notes “I greatly value the professional and business relationships that I have formed over the years, and I am looking forward to the opportunities that lie ahead”. i 183