Medibank Private to be sold

The federal government will go ahead with the sale of Medibank Private next financial year, Finance Minister Mathias Cormann says.

The precise timing and structure of the initial public offering are yet to be determined.

An independently-prepared scoping study had reaffirmed the government's long-held view that there was no compelling reason for it to own Medibank Private, Senator Cormann said.

Senator Cormann said it would not be appropriate for him to speculate on a sale price, but analysts have suggested it could be as high as $4 billion.

As part of the preparation for sale and as Medibank Private transitions to new ownership, the government has appointed three new board members.

The new directors to start on March 31 are David Fagan, Linda Nicholls and Christine O'Reilly.

Mr Fagan is a banking and major projects lawyer with Clayton Utz.

Ms Nicholls is a corporate adviser and a director of a number of companies and organisations including KDR (Yarra Trams), Sigma Pharmaceutical Group and Fairfax Media.

Ms O'Reilly is a director of CSL, Transurban, Energy Australia and Baker IDI and a deputy chair of Care Australia.