The Karnataka government is looking to maximize the Indian American Chamber of Commerce (IACC) efforts to increase the Indo-US bilateral trade to $500 billion. The state government is looking to enhance its share in the US market and also woo investors in the area of healthcare, life-sciences and chemicals.

The global reality is that MNCs are facing multiple challenges of volatile input costs and slowing demand. India and particularly Karnataka offers low processing costs and access to high quality talent, growing market for off-patent products, strengths in manufacture of affordable generics and biosimilars.

According to V Manjula, principal secretary, department of information technology, biotechnology and science & technology, government of Karnataka, the combination of a research environment and access to qualified scientific pool make the state a hot bed for investments.

The state’s Start-up culture and bio-cluster concept nurturing from hubs like the Bangalore Bio-innovation Centre and the Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology have given a head-start for entrepreneurs. The first ever Start-up Policy in the country is also from Karnataka and this reinstates our focus and recognition of new age entrepreneurships which US companies could look to collaborate, said the IT- BT-S&T secretary.

One of the first steps taken on these lines is the signing of a Letter of Intent to create the US-Indo Life Science Sister Innovation Hub between the California Institute for Quantitative Biosciences (QB3), and C-CAMP in September 2015, she said.

According to the government officials, in the area of healthcare, Karnataka’s corporate hospitals have been witnessing a reverse brain drain as Indian origin doctors flock back home. The key attractions of Indian healthcare sector are medical expertise and the exposure to increasing number of patients.

Dr. Nandakumar Jairam, chairman and Group Medical Director, Columbia Asia, said that advances in technology enable remote monitoring which creates a huge demand for specialists and radiologists as patients are looking for a second opinion. A case in point is India’s  telemedicine sector valued at $14 billion, registering a growth of 14 percent and by 2020 is estimated to touch $35 billion.

The entry of mobile apps and Hospital Information System (HIS) enable patient care and medical support in real-time. These technologies have brought in evidence-based treatment protocols and there are software solutions that prompt doctors to facilitate safe medical practices. The physician, hospital and patient have transformed best healthcare practices in India and US can have a first-hand exposure to this, said Dr. Nandakumar.

According to Dr. Vivek Jawali, chairman, Medical Advisory Council, Fortis Hospitals the highest quality care and use of advanced technology could see US patients coming to India.   India’s cardiac surgeons perform 70 per cent of the bypass surgeries on beating heart or off-pump as against 10 per cent of those done in the US.   There is huge scope for US doctors to work in India on rotation and  utilize the expertise here, replicate it back home to increase the number of procedures. Their team of junior doctors could opt India for international resident training at hospitals here.

Airing his views on the opportunities for US companies to collaborate in healthcare space, Gopal Devanahalli, COO, Manipal Hospitals said that to offset the shortage of beds and doctors, there was ample scope for public private partnerships. Manipal has teamed up with Masimo, Philips and IBM to provide quick evidence-based diagnosis and treatment.