Max Healthcare to invest Rs320 crore in Delhi cancer care centre

Max Healthcare Ltd will invest as much Rs320 crore to build a cancer hospital in Delhi.

The investment, part of a larger plan to develop its hospital in Saket, New Delhi, into a master complex of verticals such as cancer, cardiac sciences, neurosciences, transplants and diabetes, will go into setting up a cancer care centre with around 350-400 beds initially, Rohit Kapoor, senior director and chief growth officer of Max Healthcare, said in an interview.

Excluding land costs, setting up a bed at an oncology centre in Delhi-NCR costs about Rs80 lakh.

“We will be developing a dedicated facility for cancer care in Saket. Hopefully with that and the other hubs that we have, we want to position ourselves as one of the leading cancer players not just in India but Asia,” Kapoor said.

In a 26 September interview, Analjit Singh, founder and chairman of Max Healthcare, said that he wants to develop Saket into the single largest hospital in Asia.

The company has hired HKS Architects to design the complex, which is spread over a 13-acre plot that includes the existing Max Hospital in Saket, the Saket City Hospital (SCH) that Max acquired in July, and a piece of vacant land in the premises of SCH over which Max has operating rights.

SCH and Max combined have around 800 beds, which is expected to increase to more than 1,800 in phases. Across its hospitals in north India, Max has about 5,000 operating beds. Of which, around 2,300 are currently functional.

“We really want it to go big on five or six specialities such as cancer, cardiac sciences, neurosciences, transplants, and diabetes,” Kapoor said. “We have product heads for these and they are focusing exclusively on these.”

Currently, cancer treatment accounts for about 14% of Max Healthcare’s total revenue.

“The demand for cancer treatment is going to be immense. I don’t see any reason why we should not look at volume growth of 20-25%,” Kapoor said.

There are about 1.5-2 million reported cases of cancer in India and the actual number could be double that.

Oncology and cardiac sciences contribute close to 30% of the overall revenue of Max Healthcare revenue, which is estimated by to be about Rs2,200 crore. “We are looking at a 17-18% CAGR (compound annual growth rate) in our healthcare business on a five-year basis,” Kapoor said.