Henry Schein, Internet Brands form joint venture to enhance dental practice management

Henry Schein, Inc., the world's largest provider of health care products and services to office-based dental, animal health and medical practitioners, and Internet Brands, a leading provider of web presence and online marketing software, announced today the creation of a joint venture designed to deliver integrated dental technology to help the profession improve practice management and marketing as well as patient communication.

Henry Schein Practice Solutions is the leading dental practice management software company and will bring to the venture its market-leading suite of practice management systems. Internet Brands is the market leader in web-based software applications used by dental offices to attract and retain patients and manage online reputation.

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The joint venture, to be named Henry Schein One, will include the Henry Schein Practice Solutions products and services such as Dentrix, Dentrix Ascend, Easy Dental and TechCentral as well as Henry Schein's international dental practice management systems, including Software of Excellence, Logiciel Julie, InfoMed, Exan, and LabNet, among others. Henry Schein One also will include the dental businesses of Internet Brands, including web-based solutions such as Demandforce, Sesame Communications, Officite and DentalPlans.com. The teams dedicated to all these businesses will become part of the joint venture, which will initially employ approximately 1,500 team members and be headquartered in American Fork, Utah.

Henry Schein will have majority ownership of the joint venture and Internet Brands will own a minority interest, with senior management from Henry Schein and Internet Brands serving on the board of Henry Schein One. The combined entity, which will serve markets globally, had pro-forma 2017 sales of approximately $400 million. Henry Schein expects the transaction to be neutral to the balance of its 2018 earnings per share, excluding the impact of one-time transfer taxes of approximately $4.5 million, or $0.03 per share, related to completing the transaction, and to be accretive thereafter. The joint venture expects to realize between $20 million and $30 million in annual synergies by the end of year three. The companies expect to complete the transaction in the second quarter of 2018, subject to certain pre-closing conditions. Financial terms of the agreement were not disclosed.

"We are very pleased to create this joint venture with Internet Brands because we share the goal of being the best partner to help our dental customers operate successful practices for the ultimate benefit of their patients," says Stanley M. Bergman, chairman of the board and CEO, Henry Schein, Inc. "With this agreement, we combine two dental technology leaders who together will create a powerful new engine to accelerate our customers' growth. We believe our customers will have the most extensive suite of integrated programs and services, operating on leading practice management systems, to enable dental professionals to be more efficient and to increase their ability to deliver high-quality care to patients."

Henry Schein One will reportedly deliver advanced, cutting-edge technology to address the challenges created by the current lack of technology integration in dental practices. Dental teams today use disparate technology systems that often don't connect with each another, thereby wasting time for the team and their patients. The mission of Henry Schein One is to raise the level of innovation and deliver a new platform of enhanced dental software and services that work together seamlessly to share data and streamline the digital workflow for each member of the dental team. Having end-to-end management and marketing systems will reportedly enable dental teams to be better business managers, clinicians to be more efficient and patients more loyal to the practice. By helping each member of the dental team work smarter and faster to improve the practice and the entire patient experience, Henry Schein One will position dentists to focus more on delivering quality patient care.    

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Integrating Henry Schein's practice management software with Internet Brands' web-based and mobile digital marketing and communication tools will give dental teams new tools connected to their practice management systems to better communicate with current and prospective patients, minimize appointment cancellations, improve adherence to treatment plans and develop new sources of revenue.

"By combining Henry Schein's strength in practice management software with our leading digital marketing applications in this new joint venture, we intend to leverage the considerable resources of both companies to provide our customers and their patients with a better experience," says Bob Brisco, CEO of Internet Brands. "We are only scratching the surface of what we can do together to improve how dental practices interact with patients in an age of digital communications. This joint venture will harness the power of the leading brands in this market for the benefit of everyone interested in delivering and experiencing better health care. We're very excited to work with Henry Schein to create a powerful new offering that is unmatched in the industry."

The leadership of Henry Schein One brings deep knowledge and experience to the task of using modern marketing and communications technologies to enhance the customer experience. The company's chief executive officer will be James A. Harding, currently the senior vice president and CEO of Henry Schein's Global Practice Solutions Group. Harding has also served as the chief technology officer of Henry Schein, which he joined in 2000. The remainder of Henry Schein One's management team will be announced at a later date.