Terry W. Carden

Partner & Co-Founder

Education

BS, Wake Forest University

MBA, The Robbins School of Business of the University of Richmond

Terry has over thirty-two years of experience in senior-level healthcare operations, multi-site practice management, venture capital, and as an executive operator for two national healthcare consulting firms. Most recently, Terry was President and Chief Executive Officer of Health Management Resources (“HMR”), one of the nation’s leading physician practice management and physician network development firms. During his tenure at HMR, Terry managed more than eight hundred physician practice transactions and operational integrations across a myriad of specialties, including mergers, buy-side, and sell-side engagements. HMR was sold to a family office, as part of an industry roll-up strategy.

In addition to his role at HMR, Terry was a principal at HMR Ventures, where he raised more than $120 million in equity and mezzanine debt for healthcare companies, often co-investing with the institutional and high net worth investors, and serving on numerous boards of directors of successful entrepreneurial companies. He was the first seed investor in Payerpath, a web-based claims management system for healthcare providers and payers. Payerpath was sold to Misys Healthcare Systems, one of the top five healthcare IT companies in North America, and a subsidiary of UK-based Misys plc.

Before joining HMR, Terry had extensive experience as an executive operator at Medical Management Specialists (“MMS”), the country’s largest physician practice management firm. MMS provided turnkey on-site management for practices that typically employed more than fifty physicians, in an eighteen state area. Eventually serving as MMS’s Executive Vice President, Terry managed the sale of the business to Per-Se Technologies. Per-Se Technologies was sold to McKesson for $1.8B.

Terry is an avid cycler and enjoys world travel with his two daughters. Terry is a founder and sponsor of the Rural Healthcare Initiative, a charitable organization dedicated to preventing rural hospitals across the country from being forced to close their doors due to financial hardship.

Education

BS, Wake Forest University

MBA, The Robbins School of Business of the University of Richmond

In my own words

“I bring a very different perspective to the private equity business. While I have in-depth experience in the venture capital and private equity worlds, I spent more than thirty years as a healthcare operator, specializing in physician practice management. I have spent an inordinate amount of my professional life trying to convince my physician colleagues not to enter into employment models with hospitals, health systems, large payors, and private equity firms with predatory business models. Why? Because they give up their autonomy, they have some suit euphemistically in the exam room with them, their compensation is going to be capped, and of greatest importance they are never going to materially monetize all the training, hard work, and dedication to their practice and the community it serves.”

“The Aspire model is hands-down the most physician empowering private equity model in the entire market. Let me explain why: 1.) Aspire initially invests in a practice at a competitive valuation, which provides docs with a very nice check at closing, 2.) Aspire allows docs to keep up to 45% of the equity in their practice, so they have huge financial upside at exit, 3.) Aspire requires docs to keep a minimum of 30% ownership in the practice – they’re looking for partners, not employees, 4.) Aspire provides docs with the same class of stock they hold – none of the preferred versus common, phantom equity, liquidation preference, etc. games that many PE firms play, 5.) Aspire is smart enough to keep its nose totally out of clinical issues, 6.) Governance is extremely collaborative, 7.) Aspire protects physician compensation, 8.) Aspire supports continued employment of the current staff unless docs are dissatisfied with specific areas of performance.”

“It has been very personally rewarding to show docs that I’ve known for three decades how to monetize their practices and, in some instances, create generational wealth. What I do can change lives and that’s a great feeling of accomplishment.”

Terry W. Carden

Partner & Co-Founder

Education

Education

In my own words

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