Cheshire-based Pets at Home, the UK’s leading pet care business, has sold Specialist Group to Birmingham-based Linnaeus Group for £100 million. Linnaeus Group is a highly-regarded operator of veterinary practices across the UK and a subsidiary of Mars Veterinary Health. Specialist Group is comprised of several veterinary practices including Dick White Referrals (Cambridgeshire), Anderson Moores (Hampshire), North West Veterinary Specialists (Cheshire), Eye Vet (Cheshire) and Veterinary Specialists Scotland (Livingston, Scotland). Pets at Home Group CEO, Peter Pritchard stated that he was “very pleased to have agreed [on] the disposal of the Specialist Group to Linnaeus”. Pritchard added that “[The] disposal does not deviate from [Pets at Home’s] core focus of providing customers with affordable, convenient, engaging and flexible pet care solutions through our growing online platform and estate of 440 First Opinion veterinary practices and 451 stores. The disposal will provide Pets at Home with additional resources, enabling the acceleration of growth across their customer-focused pet care platform.
