Siemens Healthineers CEO bets big on India as the hub of global healthcare innovation

German multinational Siemens Healthineers, a global leader in medical imaging, diagnostics and therapeutic products and services has one of its biggest product development centres and over 10% of its 72,000 strong global workforce in India. The company which registered an annual revenue of $ 24 billion in 2024  sells its products in more than 180 countries. In an exclusive interview with Fortune India, Dr. Bernd Montag, global CEO of Siemens Healthineers talks about the emerging trends in healthcare technology, the company’s India focus, and more

EXCERPTS:

You have segregated the company’s business operations into four segments namely imaging, diagnostics, cancer care technologies, and advanced therapies like angiography systems and mobile C-arms. Which of the business segments look most promising?

These are segments with a bit of their own logic, but they are also overarching.  The big burden of global healthcare is now non-communicable diseases. In India, the infectious diseases are there, but we have made so much progress (on that front), so now the biggest fear of Indian population is cardiovascular, stroke and cardiac diseases.  You need technologies to assess, as quickly as possible, as early as possible, what is the disease and translate that information into a minimally invasive personalised treatment. Ideally, it should be augmented by use of artificial intelligence (AI) so that you are not leaving much on the decision of individual physician. This is basically the common theme across our portfolio. Whether it is imaging, diagnostics or advanced therapies, these are all basically different technologies trying to address the same topic - personalising the treatment of the most threatening diseases.

How accessible are these products and services from an India perspective?

I am a regular visitor to India and sometimes I jokingly say I do my annual pilgrimage to India. What is working very well in India is the priority of the government when it comes to access to care. What is internationally known as Modi care (Ayushman Bharat health insurance scheme) is really a success. The entrepreneurship spirit of Indian private sector is also notable (in the form of) many chains of hospitals and imaging centres. So a combination of private entrepreneurism and a clear public priority to healthcare is really the strength of India. The challenge here is twofold. One, how do we have super efficient, fit for purpose technology to provide access to care? We have a strong focus on this. The second challenge is to get qualified staff into the tier III cities. And that has to be seen as a bigger problem. Here digitalisation, artificial intelligence (AI) is trying to make sure that we bridge that knowledge gap.

Do you have partnerships with the governments?

In this case, it is exclusively with the private sector. It is with the entrepreneurs who are building the next hospital or expanding their footprint of their imaging centre and so on. They definitely see the need (for latest technologies) and they have the willingness to invest. But then the biggest challenge they have to overcome is to get the qualified staff to set up healthcare facilities in areas where so far it is under represented.

How can you strengthen this ecosystem, training people etc.,?

There are multiple levels where we can help. One is about training and education, and when we say we can train staff we are often talking about the people who are operating the technology and not necessarily the physicians. The other piece in addition to education is what we can do with technology. In many of our technologies, when it is about imaging, MRIs, CT scans, we can do it in an automated fashion. We even have a technology called ‘virtual cockpit’ where we can remotely control, and even remotely read and interpret the imaging. And interesting enough, step by step, these possibilities are also available on the treatment side. So we do radiation therapy, the planning of how you do the treatment of cancer, you can also do that remotely. You can also enable AI. We are working on endovascular robotics, you can do interventions remotely. So we are embarking on technologies in which we can give access to care in a hub and spoke model without having to deploy the same level of physicians everywhere.

How is the adoption level of these technologies in India?

The earliest adopters are the specialised chains, chains of imaging centres that do radiology services or companies like HCG, a cancer care hub and spoke model, etc. They are to me the forerunners who are deploying this technology for distribution of knowledge. Our Indian development centre team is having fruitful collaborations with Indian customers.

You don’t publish country specific revenues for India, but do report revenues from China and some other countries. By when will India business be big enough for a separate mention?

We have split the organisational operations to four regions and we have split Asia into China and rest of Asia. The reason is the similarities of situation of India with countries like Thailand or ASEAN countries are more than that with China. We have not given any country specific numbers of any countries in Europe too. But it’s just a question of time. Our businesses are developing so fast (in India) and soon we should be talking about India also.

Will your India growth be driven by the product sales or service?

Most of our business in India is from equipment service, in the sense, the maintenance of the equipment. The service business in terms of digitally enabled services and all is still in its beginning stage. However, the reason for it is not so much that the technology is not there, it is more about to what extent is the adoption curve. Its about a change in mindset here, which is to say this is my core competency as a healthcare provider, we want it. So it’s more about convincing the customer than about technology development.

Governments world over are becoming price sensitive. How do we match innovation and cost to customer?

Let me start with something which sounds like a politically correct answer. Real meaningful innovations make healthcare better and cheaper. So when you catch disease earlier, you save money. When you have an MRI which can do two times more patients, it saves money. And it’s a big topic in India because cardio vascular diseases are such a high prevalence in the country and when you can detect a coronary artery disease early, you save lives and money. From that point of view, I am always a bit careful when it comes to this notion of expensive technology. You can look at it as an investment, and not only as a cost. You need to make sure the business case. If the systems is really working for say, 10 years, and you look at the system is touching more than 60 patients a day, then the initial investment can be seen in an altogether different manner.

What are the disruptive innovations in areas like cancer or cardio vascular diseases?

I want to highlight two completely new areas of diagnostic capabilities. One is a technology for computed tomography images which is a complete paradigm shift in the quality, and resolution you can see, the additional diagnostic information you can get. If you translate this into the topic of cardiovascular disease it allows you to through a non invasive test to see exactly whether somebody has early onset of illness, whether you need to treat, whether you should place a stent or whether you should do a surgery and so on. It catches disease early and makes invasive diagnosis completely unnecessary. It is a huge step and we are years ahead of anybody else in this technology. The other one comes from a different connection, it comes from the bottom, technology that makes MRI much more affordable, in terms of system price, in terms of total cost of ownership. It is a completely real game changer in terms of the economics of doing MRI and allows bringing MRI to places which could not be thought of before. There are a lot of other innovations too. For instance, AI based radiation therapy for cancer.

Do you engage with Indian start-ups? Do you have any partnerships?

There is no product in our company which is not the result of collaboration. Typically, this collaboration is very often working with key research institutions, but also very closely with start-ups because in a way, this can also be very complimentary if somebody comes up with a new way of diagnosing a disease with AI, having a great value. We can make it part of a bigger system. We are using our strong presence in India, especially the new campus in Bengaluru to make this a real centre not only for our own innovation, but also for communication with key customers and the local start-ups.

The U.S, your key market, is turning protectionist in its trade policies. Will it impact your business?

While we are living in a world where there are lot of changes and a lot of volatility, it is also very important to think about what is not changing. What is not changing is that there are billions of people who need, want, to have good healthcare. We also see governments have healthcare as a priority implicitly or explicitly, and that certainly nobody wants to put this in danger. We also see global trends where the need for healthcare is growing and the priorities are almost similar and that is also true for India. So, like any other company, we need to navigate the current geo-political tensions. While on the other hand, I believe healthcare should not be at the forefront of trade wars, we are also a global set up and in a very well position to navigate it.

As a European company, how do you see the ongoing India-EU FTA negotiations?  Are you expecting any decisions that will help the healthcare technology sector in general?

The less the barriers there are, the better. And when you look at our specific situation, India is a very big priority of Siemens Healthineers. One is, we can say India is a important and very fast developing market, but that is not all what we are doing here, we have about 7500 employees, more than 10% of our global workforce is located in India. We have a super vibrant, innovation centre, development centre, in Bengaluru. And basically there is no product, no Siemens Healthineers product that will not have an Indian innovation inside. Now coming back to this EU-India trade agreement, these extremely complementary strengths in this collaboration is great for both regions and allows us to team up to make use of each other’s strengths for the benefit of billions of people.