Wipro, GE to integrate healthcare units

Wipro GE Healthcare, the 49:51 joint venture between Bangalore-headquartered Wipro and UK-headquartered GE Healthcare, plans to integrate several standalone units of GE Healthcare in India with itself. These include GE Healthcare Life Sciences, GE Healthcare Medical Diagnostics and GE Medical Systems India.

“What we are doing now is to provide a single face to customers, this deal today does not change any equity structure in the venture. We would be investing in the products and scaling up the manufacturing of products such as X-ray machines and CT scan etc,” V Raja, managing director at Wipro GE Healthcare told reporters on Friday.

Currently, Wipro GE Healthcare distributes almost 85% of GE Healthcare’s products and solutions in India. Once the integration is complete, Wipro GE Healthcare would be the exclusive vehicle for GE Healthcare’s business in India. The move is expected to strengthen Wipro GE Healthcare’s position in the Indian healthcare market, worth over $40 billion.
 
The integration will bring together the 1,200-odd employees of the three GE Healthcare entities and around 800 employees of Wipro GE Healthcare.Currently, roughly a quarter of the healthcare products the company sells in India are made in India. The company expects this to grow to 50-75% in the next 5-10 years.

The integration will simplify the company structure, John Dineen, president & CEO, GE Healthcare said in a statement. “This will improve service for our customers and has the potential to accelerate the introduction of more cost effective, affordable and quality healthcare solutions in South Asia.”

Wipro chairman Azim Premji said the consolidation would strengthen the relationship between the two companies, which goes back to 1990.A GE Healthcare spokesperson said the consolidation would help in realising GE’s goals of increasing people’s access to services and technologies related to healthcare by 15% by 2015.

“It would help in reaching 100 million more people every year. Also, in improving quality and efficiency by 15% by the next six years, for customers, through simplifying and refining healthcare procedures and standards of care. Also, it would lead to better utilisation and reduce transaction costs.”

Jeffery Immelt, chief executive officer of GE, who was also present at the press conference, said he expects Indian sales to double in the next 3-4 years from $3 billion now as huge growth opportunities exists in sectors such as energy and healthcare.
GE, which has over 12,000 employees in India, had in May announced that it will spend $6 billion between now and 2015 on innovative healthcare technology.