SRL Ranbaxy Ltd is in discussions with some top hospitals and clinics in Pakistan for diagnostic services including testing of clinical samples at its labs in India. A few weeks back, the company officials had discussions with a Pakistani delegation consisting of representatives of various hospitals and clinics in Pakistan.

"Pakistan is a key market for SRL Ranbaxy. Considering that the current good relations between the two countries will be maintained in future, we are seriously considering making inroads into the Pakistani market," said Vidur Kaushik, CEO, SRL Ranbaxy Ltd.

Along with Pakistan, SRL has entered in serious negotiations with major hospitals in Nigeria, Tanzania and South Africa. So far, these hospitals used to send their samples to be tested to Europe and US. Recently, SRL Ranbaxy tied up with hospitals in the Middle East and UK.

The company has appointed Blue Dart for its logistics requirements. "As soon as these samples are collected, our guys pack and dispatch the samples to one of our labs in India. The tests are immediately done and sent back to hospitals ensuring that the results reach the hospitals within 9-12 hours," said Kaushik.

SRL Ranbaxy is the first clinical laboratory in India to be accredited with National Accreditation Board for Testing and Calibration Laboratory (NABL), College of American Pathologists (CAP) and ISO IEC 17025 protocols. Right from its inception the company has conducted more than 25 million tests.

SRL Ranbaxy has about 10 labs in India with more than 500 sample collection centres. It is the only company, with all its labs centrally connected with IT. The company has 95 different technology support infrastructure in its labs. Some of the advanced technology it possess include molecular oncology, cytogenetics, fluorescence in situ hybridization or FISH technology - to probe for genetic mistakes that can be linked to childhood leukaemia, flow cytometry, and immuno histochemistry technology.

The company has a biorepository facility, where the RNA and DNA samples are collected and studied. It also has an oncorepository, with more than 250,000 slides and tissues, said Kaushik.