Primary Health Care lost a legal challenge Friday to some of the terms of a A$2.8bn takeover of Symbion Health, Australia’s largest healthcare company, by domestic rival Healthscope.

Primary, which has a 20 per cent stake in Symbion, successfully quashed an earlier attempt by Healthscope to acquire Symbion. But when Healthscope last month revived the deal, Primary took legal action to stop Symbion shareholders from approving the merger at a meeting to be held next Friday.