Fairfield-based General Electric Co. is restructuring its Indian healthcare business in an effort to boost revenues and develop more products domestically, for both Indian and global markets, GE chief executive Jeffrey Immelt said today.
GE Healthcare will consolidate all its India business within Wipro GE Healthcare, a joint venture between Indian technology giant Wipro Ltd. and GE Healthcare set up in 1990, the companies said. The joint venture currently distributes about 85 percent of GE Healthcare’s products in India.
As part of the consolidation, 1200 employees from three GE Healthcare businesses will join the joint venture.
“India’s healthcare market is on the verge of substantial growth,” Immelt told reporters in New Delhi. “We think this is an exceptionally good time to invest in India.”
Financial details of the consolidation were not revealed.
The restructuring is part of a broader move by Immelt to design and manufacture more products in the developing world — a strategy he calls “reverse innovation.”
He said about a quarter of the products sold in India are manufactured here, a ratio he’d like to see double or triple in the next five to 10 years. Those products could also be exported.
“We should get to a point where ideas start transporting back to the developed world,” Immelt said.
GE’s revenues from all its businesses in India are about $2.8 billion, a fraction of the company’s global revenues of $183 billion. GE exports over $1 billion in products and services from India and employs more than 14,500 people here. (AP)
