The Bajaj group will diversify into the healthcare business next and plans to invest over Rs 2,000 crore in Pune over the next three years, a top official has said.
Nirav Bajaj, the Chief Executive and Managing Director of Bajaj Integrated Health System, said the group will expand into up to 12 cities over the next decade. Bajaj, the first representative from the fifth generation of the over-century-old business family to helm operations, said the group is aiming to pioneer a healthcare model consisting of a tiered approach with a clinic, ambulatory services, home care and a hospital.
“We want to treat you from prevention to acute intervention, and move you away from the hospital as much as possible. We are actually attempting to push it away from the hospital to treatment at the right venue, depending on the acuity of the needs,” Bajaj, who is in his mid-30s, said.
The business will not use the usual metrics of calculating scale, like the number of beds or the average revenue per operating bed, he said, adding that the group is keen to build out the business without acquiring any existing assets as the model they have adopted is different.
Stating that the group has been present in healthcare through charity hospitals in the past, Bajaj said the present scenario in the space presents handsome opportunities to get into the business. Over the next six months, the group will be launching its first clinics and ambulatory centres in Pune, and the over 450-bed hospital will take up to four years more to build.
“In Pune, we are expected to spend about Rs 2,000-2,500 crore of capex. The format will be similar in other cities, but the economics of each city vary,” he said.
The new business will take a similar approach in each of the cities it enters, Bajaj said, adding that Mumbai will be the next on the radar. “We will be across 7-8 cities in the next 10-12 years,” Bajaj, the son of Bajaj Auto chairman Niraj Bajaj, said when asked about expansion plans.
Bajaj said the opportunity in the healthcare segment presented a “compelling” case for the family to enter the space, and the group offers him the autonomy to operate till the core family values are not compromised. Niraj Bajaj said the availability of one of the family members to manage drove it to enter the new business, and building an essential service to scale, which India can be proud of, was the driving factor.
Sanjali Bajaj, the daughter of Bajaj Finserv's chairman and managing director, Sanjiv Bajaj, said she has been engaged in the upcoming alternative investments business, where the group is planning to have private equity and real estate funds. Explaining her decision to join the business, Sanjali said, “There is no need to join somewhere else when I have this legacy that I can take forward. So, it was a very easy decision.”
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