Grooming Start-ups: India’s First Healthcare Incubator

By Rudrani Ghosh

India’s first healthcare incubator is dedicated to horning start-ups, from financial support to mentorship and beyond. In an interview with HealthStart founder Pradeep K Jaisingh, he tells us the process of selection and more on the 2021 edition of the Healthstart Accelerator programme.

HealthStart is India's first incubator dedicated to support start ups in healthcare industry through funding, mentorship and other requisite support. The report summarizes the trajectory of the accelerator programme of HealthStart and how it systematically creates an ecosystem of support (from seed funding to mentoring and other requisite solace) for entrepreneurs who are setting out their journey.

India’s leading healthcare incubator HealthStart is founded and chaired by Pradeep K Jaisingh. He is also the founder and director of International Oncology, a chain of state-of-the-art comprehensive cancer centres in India. Mr. Jaisingh has a rich experience of over 20 year working with leading global companies in India, Europe and USA, which include names such as Royal/Dutch Shell, Crompton Greaves, Frontier Systems Inc Services Limited. His work has been on aspects of healthcare entrepreneurship and healthcare innovation.

Below are the excerpts from the interview with Mr. Jaisingh.

How did you come across with the idea of building up an ecosystem around entrepreneurship?

When I relocated from US to build a chain of comprehensive cancer centres in India, the idea was to pursue healthcare entrepreneurship myself and bring the US standard of cancer care in India and while doing this a lot young entrepreneurs were approaching me for advice and mentorship. That’s when I realized the need of a support system for entrepreneurs in India. To address this gap, I decided that rather than doing this on an individual basis, why not create something more systematic and organized and hence I founded HealthStart.

Why did you choose healthcare related entrepreneurship programme drive?

There are two primary reasons to it. First, healthcare is a big passion area for me, and second, I realized that there is a bigger need for healthcare support system in India. In technology and other areas there were incubators already present through Nasscom and other state government initiatives, but nothing was there in the healthcare domain. So when we started HealthStart, this was India’s first healthcare incubator and through it we wanted to bring not only the opportunity for very early stage funding but also a strong mentorship network from the ecosystem and nurture the innovative business ideas of the entrepreneurs.

Can you brief us regarding how HealthStart Accelerator Programme functions: the process, structure and the approach?

HealthStart Accelerator Programme brings a unique opportunity for early stage healthcare entrepreneurs to get funding, mentoring & access to global network. It is a four months long  programme where we select unto 5 companies for funding and mentorship and 5 companies for only advisory services. In each of the selected companies we invest around 25 lakhs and we take a fixed amount of equity in each one of them before the funding. In addition to this we can a small equity for mentorship and advisory services. During the period of the Accelerator programme right after the selection process, all the selective startups are invited for an initial one week long curriculum where they are put through initial assessment (like their focus areas, identifying their target, how to scale up, issues like talent induction, legal frameworks among others).

How did you streamline the verticals for enrolment?

Within healthcare we are trying to look for solutions that can improve healthcare outcomes by impacting at least one or more of these areas: Improve access, quality, efficiency, efficacy, and transparency; reduce cost and / or make care affordable; improve payer system. We have focus areas that includes improvement of healthcare through infectious diseases, Mental Health: Awareness, Detection, and Management, Chronic Diseases Management, Early Detection of Cancer, Neurodegenerative diseases, AI and MI based tech care solutions. We are specifically looking for smart startups in these areas.

How does the selection procedure works?

Anywhere between 150 to 200 companies apply for the programme every year. After the initial screening, 50-60 companies get shortlisted whom our team of analysts contacts and conducts interviews. Out of these teams, 20-25 start-ups are invited before the investment committee to make a presentation. From there we finally select the ultimate 10 companies (five for funding and mentorship, and five for advisory services).

Any last year lessons you want to share?

Every year is an experience in understanding what kinds of startups are being created within India. We found that a a lot of startups are booming in the technology sphere of healthcare. We also figured out that Bangalore, Mumbai, NCR region and Hyderabad are the places where there is the maximum number of surge. While the need is much higher in the regions like Bihar, Orissa, East Uttar Pradesh etc. but the entrepreneurial drive is much lower there. Along with this, I noticed that the adoption of change in healthcare (both for doctors and consumers) is especially challenging and hence we have to provide solutions that are user friendly and easy to use.

Looking back at Accelerator programme, what are the highlights?

The feedback on the programme has been very positive. We have been able to create some very interesting companies like Healthians which is dong tremendous work as a technology platform for diagnostic services, Elth.ai, an artificial intelligence based med-tech startup that aims to solve health problem discovery and be a 24-7 medical adviser to billions of people, Aether Biomedical, a rehab robotics startup focused on using AI to improve bio-signal processing among others.

What are the new ideas HealthStart wish to witness this year?

In post-COVID era, we have realized the importance of mental health even better. So we are looking forward to witness some creative business ideas in the mental healthcare domain both in identifying and providing solutions to these problems. We are also looking forward to see the real deployment of AI/MI solution in radiology, oncology,  paediatric pneumonia among others. We are also looking forward to see people from different background coming together and bridging the gap in healthcare by improving accessibility, quality, efficiency, efficacy, and transparency.