Lupin to enter cardio-vascular therapeutics space in 10 cities by Feb

Move will mark firm's digital healthcare foray 18 months after announcement; firm also plans to enter mental and respiratory illness segments, cover 28-30 cities by CY 2023-end

Drug major Lupin is set to enter the digital healthcare space in India by launching cardio-vascular therapeutics in 10 cities by February.

The cities are: Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Ahmedabad, Jaipur, Pune and Vijayawada. The development comes a year and a half after the firm announced its entry into the digital space in June 2021, and involves the creation a new subsidiary, Lupin Digital Health. “Cardio-vascular therapy contributes 25 per cent of our India business. In India, so far digital therapeutics was focussed on wellness and diabetes management. The entry into the cardio-vascular segment will be new,” said Rajeev Sibal, President- India Region Formulations (IRF), Lupin.

In the initial phase, Lupin will be focussing on the ACS (Acute coronary syndrome) space and will expand to heart failure and hypertension in the cardio-vascular space later. “Once we are able to complete the cardio-vascular space, we will get into other chronic diseases like mental illness and respiratory issues,” said Sidharth Srinivasan, chief executive officer, Lupin Digital Health. The company’s plan is to expand their digital therapeutics services to around 28-30 cities by the end of the next calendar year.

The company said its services will be based on monitoring, adherence and awareness. They will include providing accurate monitoring devices, real-time updates of vital parameters, timely alerts of off-range reading, reminders to schedule doctor appointments, expert guidance, health mall for medicine and lab tests and education modules.

“Our objective is not to replace the doctor but to follow up through technology, IOT devices and applications,” Srinivasan added. The firm is planning to spread its presence by taking more interventional cardiologists into confidence. Lupin aims to cover 1,500-2,000 cardiologists by the first quarter of 2023 and later expand to 4,000 by the end of the year. The country has about 7,000 cardiologists.

“We will be having a technology team based out of Bengaluru and an operations team to handle patient interface. We will start operations in the first ten cities by January-end or early February,” Srinivasan said. 

The company said it is targeting a big business space, as nearly 250 million are suffering from cardiac problems, of which around 100 million have already had a heart attack and survived. "They have a possible risk of deteriorating, that’s where we will come into action,” Srinivasan added.