The billionaire family that founded and sold the On The Run petrol station and convenience store business for $1.15 billion is bankrolling the purchase of a medicinal cannabis firm by ASX-listed health group Vitura.
Charlie Shahin will invest $5.1 million into Vitura and become its third-largest shareholder. The funding will allow the company to acquire Candor Medical, which provides prescription treatments, including access to medicinal cannabis, through telehealth consultations.
Mr Shahin, who has acquired an 11.4 per cent stake in Vitura, said there was growing demand for medicinal cannabis. “There are about a million Australians who rely on it to treat some of the side effects of traditional medicine,” he said in an interview after the deal was announced.
Vitura has been through some rocky times. However, Mr Shahin, whose family sold the On The Run business to ASX-listed Viva Energy last year, said an overhaul of the health group under new chairman Robert Iervasi would lead to better returns.
“It’s poised to deliver a consistent return. The strategy is clear and should deliver shareholder value,” he said.
Mr Iervasi is the chief executive of SPC Global and a former boss of the Asahi beer business in Australia. Mr Shahin is also a large shareholder in SPC Global, a big food producer that listed on the ASX last year.
The Shahin family built a fortune after its patriarch, the late Fred Shahin, arrived in Australia. In 1984, he answered an advertisement in The Adelaide Advertiser for buyers of a BP petrol station in the working-class suburb of Woodville Park. The family expanded into a chain of convenience stores, and later into property and agriculture, over the next four decades.
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