Date:26/09/2007 URL: http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/2007/09/26/stories/2007092651900200.htm

Back GE Healthcare focusing on products for domestic market

Our Bureau

New Delhi, Sept. 25 GE Healthcare, the healthcare and life sciences solutions company, expects sales of medical products from India to reach $800 million in the next three years.

“We currently have sales of $475 million, and this is both domestic and exports, and we are growing at 18-20 per cent a year,” said Mr V. Raja, President and CEO, GE Healthcare South Asia.

With a 21,000-strong team of employees, GE Healthcare is increasing its efforts to develop products in India for India. “Our engineers sitting in Bangalore are developing products looking at the specific need of the country, the power situation, and the propensity to pay,” said Mr Raja.

GE Healthcare would like to shift the focus from late disease to early detection and diagnosis, and is promoting its products like the ‘Mac 400’, an electrocardiograph designed, developed by GE Healthcare technologists at the John F Welch Technology Centre in Bangalore and manufactured by Wipro GE Healthcare.

It is easy to use and portable, making it particularly advantageous for use in rural India, said the company at an ‘Early Health’ summit organised in the Capital on Tuesday.