Healthcare entrepreneurs must evolve amid boom of Indian startups, IT News, ET CIO
Malik, who is one of the main Covid warriors with a commitment to help around 10 lakh people get vaccinated through his Radix Healthcare facility in Delhi, stressed that while the health sector deserves more government funding, the The current boom in the startup industry can help entrepreneurs chart a new path to slowly but steadily overhaul the huge healthcare ecosystem.
“This is a golden opportunity to serve a nation. The bigger question is how we are going to bring proper health care to small towns in India and millions of villagers in these times of Covid. For starters, diagnostic and pharmacy startups can leverage AI / ML technologies to reach the backcountry, â€Malik told IANS.
He admitted that despite heavy rules and regulations and legal challenges, Indian entrepreneurs can rise to the challenge of transforming the fragmented healthcare sector.
“Now, more than 300 AI companies are working on medical imaging. New era technology can surely transform India’s health technology sector. The government should also prioritize allocating additional funds to the sector so that the task becomes easy “, he underlined.
The 2021 budget increased health spending by 137 percent, in line with the National Health Policy’s 2017 GDP target of increasing health spending to 2.5 percent by 2025.
India will spend Rs 2.23 lakh crore on health care. An amount of Rs 35,000 crore will be spent on Covid-19 vaccines as part of the expenditure of Rs 2.23 lakh crore.
In 2016, Malik launched a co-working platform called Innov8, which was later acquired by Oyo, backed by Softbank, in 2019.
Supported by Y-Combinator, innov8 is currently one of India’s leading coworking companies.
According to Malik who has invested in nearly 80 startups / companies to date, the next big revolution is expected to come from the healthcare space in the country.
“India has gone beyond being a BPO or a mega customer base for the world. We create world class products. We will be a huge digital democracy by 2050 and the world’s largest software producer. Healthcare startups must jump on it. the bandwagon now so that millions of people can receive first-rate diagnosis and treatment in the near future, â€said Malik.