India to Rank among the Top 3 Healthcare Markets by 2020

It is no secret that the Indian healthcare market is witnessing a tremendous growth in recent years and continues to make headway into the global healthcare arena. Currently, the booming healthcare sector and its profiting subsectors are on the upbeat, largely influencing the country’s position in the world market. The Indian healthcare market today is attracting more and more investments from public and private players, contributing to its major technological advancements/innovations and highly-efficient systems that stand in part with the global practices to offer top-notch quality healthcare services. As a result, the Indian healthcare market is expected to see a threefold growth in terms of its value in the global market in the coming years.

The Current Healthcare Market in India

The entire healthcare market in India is constituted of public/private healthcare organizations, pharmaceuticals companies, diagnostics industry (imaging and pathology), medical equipment and supplies, health insurance, and the emerging telemedicine/e-health sector, all of which have been contributing to the growth of the sector on the global level. With the economic growth drivers and the intrinsic strength of the industry’s subsectors, the healthcare industry is emerging as a prominent participant in the global arena. In recent years, medical tourism, telemedicine, pharmaceutical sector, the diagnostic services, and medical equipment sector in India have gained immense global recognition and demand.

Owing to its exponential growth, the value of the Indian healthcare industry is being estimated to reach $ 372 billion by the year 2022. The growing incidence of lifestyle diseases, NCDs, and the rising demand for affordable healthcare owing to the technological advancements are influencing the growth of the sector. Moreover, the emergence of telemedicine, e-health technologies, and rapid penetration of health insurance, together with government initiatives, tax benefits, and incentives are driving the healthcare market in the country.

Future Market Growth:

The immense progress of the Indian healthcare industry, stirred by various growth factors, has hiked the industry expectations in the coming years. It is expected that India would rank amongst the top 3 healthcare markets in the world, by 2020, in terms of incremental growth. The diagnostics market in India is expected to grow at the rate of 20.4% CAGR to reach a whopping USD 32 billion in 2022 from USD 5 billion in 2012. Similarly, the healthcare information technology market in India is expected to grow 1.5 times by 2020. The in-patient health market is expected to grow at a CAGR of 13% during 2015-20. Overall, the Indian healthcare sector is expected to rise at a CAGR of 16 percent to be $280 billion in size by 2020. However, to make it happen, the country needs the right policy framework coupled with a proper infrastructure impetus.

Several sub-segments in the Indian healthcare industry are strengthening the country’s position in the global healthcare hub. In those lines, medical tourism has emerged as a strong sub-segment in the Indian healthcare industry and the market is witnessing tremendous growth over the past years. India's growing strength in healthcare delivery and the comparative cost advantage over quality services is attracting people from different parts of the world to India. As a result, the medical tourism market is expected to triple its growth by 2020 to USD 11 billion from USD 2.8 billion in 2014. Similarly, the country’s telemedicine market is also showing significant growth in the healthcare domain for its increased accessibility and better patient health outcomes together with greater engagement, improved safety, and lower costs.

As of now, the Indian healthcare industry is witnessing a robust growth trajectory, thanks to the growing health awareness, increased public expenditure, and the demand for quality healthcare. It is high time to realize the significance of healthcare in contributing to the economic development both at national and state levels, and thus provide higher government focus and greater budgetary allocation for the sector improvements.

The impact of the healthcare industry to the country’s GDP depends on the government spends and investments. Investment opportunities in the Indian healthcare sector have seen a significant increase over the past few years, attracting private equity (PE) and venture capital (VC) companies. Being one of the largest sectors in the country in terms of employment and revenue generation, investments made in healthcare delivery and health education would possibly increase the country’s employment rate and propel the overall economic growth, thus impacting the country’s GDP substantially.

No doubt, the immense growth of the Indian healthcare in the global market has swelled its market presence into a billion dollar industry. The increasing urbanization, growing population, changing demographics, and the improved life expectancy in the country has spurred the need and demand for quality and efficient healthcare services. With proper investments, government policy initiatives and technological integration/innovation can aggregate the growth of the sector further and push its position to even higher, making it as one of the prime players in the global market in future.