Medbase takes majority stake in Ardentis Cliniques Dentaires

Medbase acquired the majority shareholding in Ardentis Cliniques Dentaires from Columna Capital, completing on 14 August 2025. The management team reinvested to retain a significant minority interest, with co-chief executives Mark Bischof and Yves Corthésy continuing to lead the company. Founded in 1993 with a single clinic in Vevey, Ardentis operates 20 dental and orthodontic clinics across the cantons of Vaud, Valais, Fribourg, Neuchâtel and Geneva, most in central urban locations. It covers routine care through to orthodontics, implantology, oral surgery, hygiene and cosmetic treatment, and runs its own laboratory at its Puidoux headquarters, producing prosthetics in Switzerland for the whole network, alongside a central call centre. It employs 450 people, including around a hundred dentists, and treats approximately 70,000 patients a year. Grouping clinics addresses two constraints of the profession. A single practice cannot justify the equipment that specialist treatment requires, nor employ the range of specialists patients need, so cases are referred elsewhere. And a dentist approaching retirement in an independent practice has no obvious buyer, since few younger practitioners want to purchase a business alongside starting one. A group resolves both: it buys the practice and offers the dentist employment, while concentrating specialists and equipment across a shared patient base. Under Columna Capital since December 2019, the group grew from 12 to 20 sites and from 77 to 149 chairs, through 15 openings, acquisitions and patient-book transactions, while building the central functions supporting them. Medbase already operated 43 dental clinics in German-speaking Switzerland under the zahnarztzentrum.ch name, within a network of around 190 medical centres, pharmacies and practices employing more than 4,400 healthcare professionals. Ardentis extended that coverage into the French-speaking cantons, where it had no presence. UBS advised Columna Capital and the management team, with CMS as legal counsel, Forvis Mazars on vendor financial due diligence and Candesic on commercial. Deloitte advised Medbase on financial and human resources matters, with Bär & Karrer on legal and tax.