Last week Best Buy (Richfield, Minn.) confirmed that it would be purchasing health services provider GreatCall Inc. (San Diego) for $800 million in cash – the electronics retailer’s largest acquisition to date.
GreatCall, which sells senior living products and services, has an annual revenue of $300 million and provides personal emergency response services as well as mobile and connective devices to its 900,000 paying subscribers, reports Reuters. Best Buy’s CEO Hubert Joly said the acquisition gives the company an opportunity to fuse the service with its merchandising, marketing, sales and service capabilities.
The transaction is expected to close by the end of the third fiscal quarter of 2019, pending regulatory approvals. GreatCall will operate out of a separate unit of the retailer’s operations, and its current CEO, David Inns, will remain in his position after the sale closes.