What is Philips Healthcare’s position in the Indian healthcare market?
| Rekha Ranganathan |
Philips has seen a double digit growth in the healthcare business and we are the market leader in patient monitoring, cardiovascular, defibrillators and high-end MRI and CT-scanner. In terms of percentage growth, our business grew by 30 per cent plus over the last three years. We believe this data and our market position reflect the focus we’ve placed on serving the industry.
What are Philips’ strategies to consolidate its hold on the Indian market?
Our new strategies revolve around three core themes: therapeutic focus, India specific products and finance.
We made a decision to focus our effort in five critical healthcare spaces; radiology, cardiology, oncology, critical care and obstructive sleep apnea/home respiratory care. Across each of these areas we’re looking to provide both accessible and affordable healthcare products and solutions because we believe everyone needs access to healthcare, regardless of where they live, be it a Metro, a tier one, tier-II or tier-III cities.
We’re also developing products specifically for India but also recognising that they have value in other emerging markets. The Philips Innovation Campus in Bangalore is tasked with developing products for us here. We also have a manufacturing facility in Chakan, India. We have introduced over 33 products in the last one year of which more than 10 have been in the value segment space (e.g. Clearvue Ultrasound, Goldway monitors). These products are specifically made for India, designed for the affordable segment.
Finally, we recognise that healthcare is evolving in India, as the transition from treating infectious to chronic diseases occurs. Chronic diseases are often more costly and involve ongoing diagnostics to track disease progression. At the same time, our healthcare system is struggling to keep up with the demand. We are now providing financing options so that a hospital or hospital system can make significant purchases such as an MRI or CT-scanner. We are thereby helping to increase access in healthcare as well.
Tell us about your marketing innovations behind the leading brands of Philips Healthcare.
We work very hard to ensure that our brand remains strong. The Philips Healthcare brand represents innovation, quality and design in each healthcare product. All our marketing efforts work to support the brand promise.
Since we’re primarily a diagnostics provider, education is the mainstay of what we do. We offer training programmes for physicians to ensure that when new technological innovations come into the market, they can take advantage of the technology themselves. For example, with our MRI platforms we help radiologists and technicians learn how to find an abnormality in the shortest amount of time.
We also need to educate patients on why early diagnosis is important and that technology like ‘Time of Flight’ can help detect problems sooner. By providing training to healthcare professionals and educating consumers, we help our customers differentiate themselves in the market.
What do you think is the need of the hour of the Indian medical devices market?
The Indian medical devices market is evolving and changing. We believe there are two key needs in the marketplace at the moment. One has been with us for a while and the other is just starting to make itself known. The first is high performance at an affordable price and the second is connectivity.
Philips is addressing the first by understanding the unique needs of our customers and then offering them a portfolio of products, a range so we find the best fit. For example, we have a formidable patient monitoring portfolio. We can also offer state-of-the-art performance through our ClearVue series and at the same time offer affordable solutions through our Suresigns and Goldway series.
The need that’s just starting to make itself known is connectivity. We view this as connectivity within the hospital setting and connectivity between hospitals and health centres. Within the hospital, customers want diagnostic equipment to share files, share information with each other and centrally. In other words, if you have a patient’s vital statistics and the CT-scan electronically stored in one place, it makes the diagnosis easier, ensures data isn’t misplaced and allows healthcare professionals to easily refer back to older data so that they can chart progress.
The second type of connectivity is between healthcare facilities. We believe the time is ripe for our eICU product that lets hospital networks connect to each other and manage patients in small towns and cities. This enables specialists in a major hospital, who are in high demand and time constrained, to monitor a patient and review the patients’ status on screen from their base hospital.
What are the challenges of the Indian healthcare market? How would you navigate through it?
Delivering affordable healthcare to India’s billion-plus people presents enormous challenges and opportunities for the medical community. According to internal estimates, the Indian healthcare delivery market has significant headroom for growth with the country lagging on all key healthcare delivery metrics (hospital beds, physicians per 100,000 population, per cent of Indians insured) when compared to countries like the US and China. We, as Philips, recognise it as a big opportunity to bring in new products and solutions, work with various stakeholders (government, for profit, non-profit) and contribute to the provision of quality healthcare.
Philips Healthcare has re-jigged its product development philosophy, by opening a manufacturing facility here. What is your say on this?
Philips is investing in India to manufacture quality healthcare products for a healthier India. Adding R&D to healthcare manufacturing at Chakan, allows Philips to provide end-to-end solutions at various price points as well as service infrastructure. Through combining human insights and clinical expertise, Philips aims to improve patient outcomes while lowering the burden on the healthcare system.
What would you say about the inherent bias in developed markets where prices were associated with technology?
The Indian market has a varied set of customers and segments. There are customer like Fortis, Apollo and Max to name a few who offer the best, world class technology for their patients. For them the best technology is required, similar to Western markets. For expanding affordable segments, we cater to the needs of the customers where pricing and service is the key criteria for purchase. As a technology provider, our products need to scale to the needs of the different segments and pricing is only one criteria for purchase.
Tell us about Philips Healthcare’s approach to the market in India.
We are committed and continue to serve the Indian healthcare market by bringing the best in class technology and supporting it with best in class customer service. Philips is driving 3 A’s – awareness, access and affordability in healthcare.
- Generating awareness about various products and solutions with doctor and patient awareness programmes
- Creating access through solutions in tier-II, tier-III markets
- Driving affordability for customers with models such as financial lease and public-private partnership.
We are building an ecosystem of partners by engaging with customers and distributors and increasing our connection and collaboration with hospitals and healthcare professionals. Philips Healthcare is committing resources to make technology more affordable so we can serve the wide spectrum of our customers’ needs. For a market like India, Philips will have more products which are best in class in terms of technology and yet affordable to serve the need of hospitals in tier-II and tier-III cities. We are building our sales and service footprint to take these products to our customers in tier-II and tier-III cities.
How do you want your customers to perceive Philips Healthcare?
As the healthcare leader that collaborates with them to find the right healthcare solutions for their needs, increases access and affordability. We want to be known as a technology leader that pioneers best solutions for their needs.