2 people sitting on a bench outside Caritaslaiset's centre with Diakonissalaitos and Caritaslaiset logos at the bottomOur Finnish member Diakonissalaitos has recently purchased the entire share capital of Caritas Palvelut Oy, owned by our member in Northern Finland Caritas-Säätiö.

The acquisition secures the growth of Caritas’s services in Northern Finland and offers Diakonissalaitos new opportunities as a provider of social and health care services for specific groups.

Caritas Palvelut Oy offers diverse sheltered housing and home services for people with disabilities and elderly people in Rovaniemi and the Oulu region. The organisation runs 25 sheltered housing units and a hospital employs approximately 600 social workers and health care experts and posted a turnover of EUR 30.4 million in 2019.

This acquisition supports our strategy of nationwide expansion. Caritas’s expertise and diverse services offered in Northern Finland complement the Diakonissalaitos’ services and create opportunities for joint development and growth. We are very happy to have the people of Caritas in our community”, says Olli Holmström, Diakonissalaitos CEO.

For Caritas-Säätiö, the primary purpose of this operation is to ensure the continuity and development of its services and to lay the groundwork for the expansion of joint diaconal work in the Oulu region.

Caritas Palvelut Oy will continue its operations as a subsidiary of Diakonissalaitos. Operations will continue under the company’s current name and its personnel will continue in their duties with full benefits. The change will not affect the company’s existing contracts or customer relationships.

It was important to us that the new owner would continue providing our services and ensure their growth and development according to our shared values while facilitating increased cooperation between our two foundations in social and diaconal projects.  Diakonissalaitos’ solid finances and dynamic activity in the field of social and health care services safeguard the company’s development amidst tightening competition and the transformations brought by the social and health care service reform”, says Heikki Keränen, Caritas-Säätiö Chairperson.

The Deaconess Foundation is an over 150-year-old foundation that works boldly for human dignity. The Foundation, its service provider for the disabled Rinnekoti, and its subsidiary Diakonissalaitoksen Hoiva Ltd provide effective social welfare and health care services that make the everyday lives of their customers better. The Deaconess Foundation employs 2,300 people nationwide and its combined turnover in 2019 was EUR 160 million. The foundation is a social enterprise, for which profitable business is a tool for building a better and more equitable society.

Caritas-Säätiö is an Oulu-based diaconal foundation established in 1998. The purpose of the foundation is to promote the quality of life of the elderly and disabled. The foundation will continue its community work and the implementation and development of diaconal projects.

 

Find more about this acquisition on Diakonissalaitos’ website.

 

Photo © Diakonissalaitos