Harpeth Ventures Announces Investment in HomeFirst Home Healthcare
Harpeth Ventures Opportunity Fund is pleased to announce a growth equity investment in HomeFirst Home Healthcare, a provider of traditional home health services operating within a 24-county area of Middle Tennessee.
With an initial close in May 2020, Harpeth Ventures Opportunity Fund is an investment fund founded by principals of Harpeth Capital leveraging the firm’s network to target venture stage investments primarily in the healthcare sector. HomeFirst represents the Fund’s first investment.
Harpeth Ventures is supporting a management-led investor group with decades of experience in the home health industry in the acquisition of an existing agency comprising two Certificates of Need that is being rebranded with a new management team. Of note, this team has been particularly successful identifying underperforming and underutilized assets within the home health space.
“We have been working closely with the prior owner for some time to structure a transaction that allows for a clean transition to new ownership and creates a platform well positioned for substantial growth,” said Jim Happ, President and CEO of HomeFirst. “We appreciate the support of Harpeth Ventures as well as their ability to move quickly once we finalized an agreement with the seller, and are particularly excited about utilizing their network of relationships to enhance HomeFirst’s business.”
Said Chuck Byrge, “We are very excited to have the opportunity to partner with Jim and the team on this transaction. The combination of a proprietary investment opportunity, prior relationship with the management team, previous success in the space, and our ability to bring our network to bear to accelerate growth aligns perfectly with our Fund’s investment thesis.”