Health Care Global Enterprises (HCG), which has a chain of oncology centres across the country, is all set to raise Rs 40 crore for its next phase of expansion, including global forays.

The company is looking at Private Equity in this regard and is in dialogue with several players. The funds are expected to be coming in a few months, Dr. BS Ajai Kumar, chairman, HCG told Pharmabiz.

Over the last three years, HCG has invested Rs. 125 crore raised through IDFC Private Equity, Evolvence India Life Sciences and PremjiInvest, a fund sponsored by Wipro chief Azim Premji.

Going by the huge demand for treatment for cancer which affects around 2.5 million in India with over 8 lakh new cases being reported and 5.5 lakh deaths occurring annually indicates the need for high quality, comprehensive and affordable care. HCG is planning to invest Rs 400 crore for new centres. Efforts are on to hit the capital market. Before that it, will source resources through debt and internal accruals besides PE support. It will see HCG centres increase from the current 16 centres to 160. By March 2010, number of beds will be 1,000 from the current 400 beds. Currently more than half of its 16 centres are Greenfield projects, said Dr Ajai Kumar.

The Bangalore-based HCG has network of 16 centres with a substantial presence now in the Tier II and Tier III cities including Shimoga, Erode, Vijayawada, Nasik, Ranchi and Hubli to name a few. It has around 1,000 patients accessing its facility as out patients.

Current projects on hand are at Varanasi and Kolkata which will be commissioned soon. In the international arena, it is investing Rs. 25 crore to start operations in Bangladesh. In Sri Lanka it will infuse Rs. 25 crore and is also viewing Africa to have a base there, Dr. Ajai Kumar said.

The company has also opted for the inorganic growth path to attain rapid growth with flexible expansion plans to adopt its hub and spoke cancer care network model that has been approved by validated by PEs and venture capitalists.

In terms of technology installations for diagnosis and therapy, HCG has invested in Image-guided radiation therapy (IGRT) for its SMH Curie Cancer Centre, New Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore, Kolkata and Ahmedabad. Early this year, the company installed the CyberKnife and Digital Mammogram in Bangalore and is looking at installing these at other centres.