HCL Corporation forays into healthcare; to invest Rs 1,000 cr

Shiv Nadar-led HCL Corporation today announced Rs 1,000 crore investment to foray into the healthcare and wellness business and said it is aiming to cover 20 million people by 2020.
HCL Corporation, the controlling arm of IT services major HCL Technologies and former PC maker HCL Infosystems, created a new subsidiary -- HCL Healthcare that will focus on the 300 million strong Indian urban middle class.
It has roped in Johns Hopkins Medicine International to start this venture under HCL Avitas, a subsidiary of HCL Healthcare. John Hopkins will provide consultative services.
Launching the company, HCL Founder Shiv Nadar said that education and healthcare will be key enablers of the country's future progress and HCL wants to contribute to this journey.

"HCL Healthcare intends to provide innovative medical services and products. We will invest Rs 1,000 crore over the next five years in expanding the operations and reach," HCL Healthcare Chairman Surya Mohapatra told PTI.
The focus is to cover the urban middle class, which is about 300 million-strong, with state-of-art services and products as well as patient-centred care, he added.

HCL Healthcare Vice Chairman Shikhar Malhotra said the firm's immediate goal is to create an organised technology-led healthcare system.
"HCL Healthcare intends to be that partner and provide patient-centred care to over 20 million people by 2020," he added.
HCL Healthcare has acquired a controlling stake in Bharat Family Clinic, a primary healthcare provider. Bharat runs two health and wellness clinics in and around Delhi. These will from be re-named as HCL Avitas clinics.

"We will begin with a network of multi-speciality clinics across the country, starting with the National Capital Region. We also plan to hire over 1,500 physicians in the next five years," HCL Avitas CEO Harish Natarajan said.
As technology is HCL's strength, the clinics will be networked giving patients access to their medical history and the best specialists available. Association with John Hopkins will help in emulating the global best practices and best evidence-based systems, he added.
John Hopkins University President Ronald Daniels said the university has USD 1 billion that will be used to address challenges in healthcare. Of which around USD 400 million will be utilised on individualised-healthcare globally.

"Association with HCL is a part of our commitment to spread healthcare awareness and solutions across the globe," he added.
Johns Hopkins Medicine International CEO Steven J Thompson said, "By sharing our knowledge, clinical expertise and best practices with firms like HCL, we strive to improve global health. We hope to establish, with HCL Healthcare, a new paradigm in patient care in India.