Covid: China learnings help Indegene save lives of its employees in India

At a time when the second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic has wreaked havoc across the country, Indegene's practices can become a template for the corporate industry to manage the pandemic

Till the end of 2019, Dr. Saurabh Jain was in Beijing heading the China business at enterprise health tech firm Indegene. Bengaluru-headquartered Indegene has a large footprint in China with a significant medical affairs portfolio. After the coronavirus (Covid-19) outbreak was first identified in Wuhan, the most populous city in Central China, in December 2019, the company pilot tested an initiative headed by Jain in Wuhan. The team assisted doctors with data collation and deploying its medical writers to develop manuscripts for therapy tried on patients. This initiative was launched for Indian doctors in May 2020 in India.

These learnings are now enabling the company to provide support to its own employees and community at a time when the second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic has wreaked havoc across the country. These practices can also become a template for the corporate industry to manage the pandemic.

“In China, we were working with many healthcare institutes and doctors including the ones in Wuhan. We were able to publish a lot of data about the management of Covid and took those services back to India and passed them on to the Indian doctors,” said Dr.Saurabh Jain, vice president, co-commercialization and China operations at Indegene. “Now in 2021, our focus has been shifted completely about how we can help our employees in managing the pandemic,” said Jain. 

Indegene was recently valued at about $700 million, after a funding round. It sells its medical and tech combination to top global pharma companies. It ensures the efficiency of their critical functions like research and development, medical and marketing globally. 

The members of the Indegene leadership team are now spearheading the ‘Covid response team’ to save the lives of their employees and their families from the pandemic. These include the employees in remote areas of Uttar Pradesh, Karnataka, Jharkhand, Karnataka, and Delhi. 

Indegene is doing this by using its in-house medical expertise and technology. It is updating daily dashboards on the health status of affected employees and family members. This involves tracking and updating beds, oxygen and medicines availability data on dashboards. This is being done across the country as employees are working from home.

The firm also has several doctors on board and employees who had joined it from pharma companies. This has enabled medical advice and networking with hospitals and companies for medicines and other facilities.

“Through the clinical trial investigators that we have worked with in the past, we've been able to leverage our relationships effectively in remote locations as well as big cities,” said Sudip Sinha, vice president, digital CRO (contract research organisation), Indegene. “This enabled us to support employees to get access to ICU beds, medicines and oxygen.”

The company is scaling up these efforts, anticipating a further contagious wave. As part of the Covid response team, Indegene has formed three teams working to provide support for employees 24/7.

There is a central support cell. It tracks each patient or the employee and dependents monitoring vitals daily. The other support includes medical insurance and an all India online (intranet) resource centre for beds, medicine and oxygen. There is a central logistic cell that is helping in making arrangements for such facilities. This includes isolation facilities at partner hotels.

Partnering with home healthcare service provider Nightingales, the firm is able to provide 24x7 digital services. Here general practitioner consultation will be provided to all the employees and their dependents across the country. They also have access to services such as lab tests,  radiological scans and the setting up of oxygen support at home. The firm also provides access to physiotherapists, nutritionists and mental health professionals.

Covid impact

Founded in 1998 by five first-generation entrepreneurs, Indegene has more than 4,000 employees across North America, Europe, China, Japan and India. It counts healthcare and pharma companies Johnson & Johnson, Novartis, Sanofi and Amgen among its top customers.

Indegene recently attracted $200 million funding from private equity firm Carlyle Group and Brighton Park Capital. It is observing an acceleration of its business amid the pandemic. This has helped it to emerge as the leading digital transformation partner to the global life sciences industry.

Manish Gupta, co-founder and CEO of Indegene said while digital adoption is still at an early stage in the pharmaceutical industry compared to some other industries, Covid has accelerated it.

“Digital capability is quickly becoming a source of competitive advantage and is driving demand for specialized technology solutions coupled with strong domain expertise,” said Gupta.

Indegene’s global reach and growing presence with many of the largest global pharmaceutical companies has enabled the company to grow at more than 25 per cent revenue compound annual growth rate (CAGR) over a decade. This growth rate is accelerating due to strong industry tailwinds driving a  shift towards digital-first operations.

"Since the Covid-19 situation erupted, we are witnessing an unprecedented acceleration by the life sciences industry towards digital and non-personal engagement with HCPs (healthcare professionals) to minimize any disruption in the continuity of information dissemination,” said Gupta.

The company has registered 45 per cent revenue growth in FY21 and expects to close FY22 at $200 million revenue.