PE-owned Healthcare Provider in Outpatient Rehabilitation: New Digital Therapy Platform Build
How Anding helped a PE-owned rehabilitation provider replace a costly SaaS dependency with a proprietary digital therapy platform in 15 months
A leading German outpatient rehabilitation provider with 20+ centers had identified the digitization of therapy delivery as a key pillar ofits PE-backed value creation plan. At project start, only half of the centers offered digital therapy, relying on a third-party SaaS solution that was costly, inflexible, and not suitable for group-wide scaling. The company had no centralized IT function and no prior platform development experience. Anding & Company was engaged to lead the full program — from strategic analysis through live rollout.
Point of Departure: A SaaS dependency limiting scaleand margin
The incumbent SaaS model created a structural conflict: as the group grew, so did third-party costs, leaving center management with limited incentive to expand digital adoption. On the regulatory side, obtaining the necessary accreditation required adherence to demanding minimum standards — including individualized therapy plans, multimodal content delivery, and high data protection requirements — adding significant complexity to any build scenario.
Phase 1: Buy vs. Build feasibility study
In an 8-week exercise, Anding evaluated the build option through a hypothesis-driven analysis combining market research, provider interviews, and a 5-year Net-Profit-of-Ownership calculation. Results indicated a seven-figure cumulative EBITDA potential in the build scenario, significantly ahead of both the incumbent and other available SaaS alternatives. The phase concluded with IT partner selection, team formation, and a development roadmap.
Phase 2: Development-ready prototype
The central challenge was scoping the Minimum Viable Product — balancing regulatory requirements, business value, and development speed. Anding managed joint working sessions between business and IT to define and validate features with therapists and the regulator. In parallel, a scalable content production process was designed and IT partner contracts were structured to protect platform autonomy and cap budget risk.
Phase 3: Development, go-live, and rollout
The nine-month development phase was oriented toward one primary milestone: regulatory accreditation. Structured user testing across multiple centers maintained quality without sacrificing development speed. Rollout in pilot centers followed a six-week playbook, with over 700 therapy content items uploaded at go-live. Financial impact includes an estimated low double-digit percentage valuation uplift at exit and seven-figure operating income gains.
Building a proprietary digital platform in an organizationwith no prior development experience, under regulatory constraints, and withina 15-month timeline demands a team that can translate between business and IT,enforce prioritization under pressure, and embed operational ownership as itgoes.