Spotlight

A Metropolis in every metropolis?

"We want to have one lab in every state of the country. We also want to do offshoring and be present in all the emerging markets of the world like the Middle East, Africa, South East Asia, South Asia," says Ameera Patel, Executive Director, Metropolis. With an aggressive team of young management and complementing ideas she plans to take this forward. Arshiya Khan finds out how

Dr Sushil Shah, Chairman, Metropolis

Metropolis was started by Dr Sushil Shah, Chairman, Metropolis, in 1981 as a referral laboratory with a vision of being pioneers in launching the latest tests in pathology under the name of Dr Shah's Lab. During that time he was also on the board of directors for Dr Reddys, Zydus Cadila and also a pathologist at Breach Candy Hospital, HN hospital, Saifee Hospital, Camballa. In the year 1997 he realised that he was diluting interest in his own lab, and hence, decided to resign from the entire directorship and revamp his own lab. And that is how Metropolis was born. From one single lab it is now a chain of over 50 labs across the country. From sowing the seed to seeing it grow and taking it where it is today, Dr Shah has witnessed all ups and downs. And since it all runs in their blood, the daughter can not be far behind the father. Ameera Patel has been following her father's footsteps since a very young age and has done almost everything, from answering phone calls and labeling the samples, to being on the board of directors for her own company. After working with various leading companies, "I did not enjoy any of the jobs and decided that I have to have my own business. I wanted to be an entrepreneur," says Patel.

Building the model

After shifting base from Gamdevi to Mumbai, Patel sat in all the meetings, spent time with operations and made few changes. She then decided that there were a lot of opportunities in healthcare, as it had not really taken up at a corporate set up. And India itself was just on the brink of taking off. "Year 2000-01 was the time when we were getting accelerated economic growth," says Patel. Soon in that year itself, friend and colleague of Dr Shah, Dr GSK Velu, Managing Director, Metropolis, joined as a partner, and the plan of taking the company national was laid down. After studying the market, improving on cost savings and spending 20 years in this market, "Metropolis was still not a branded name across the country. But there was no other pathlab known across the country either," says Patel. This made them realise that they needed to grow, but the only question was—how? To grow and build their own independent chain of labs would be an expensive affair, so they partnered with different laboratories across the country as equity partners in different companies. "After investing in these companies we made quite a few changes. These labs also faced the same issue that we faced in 2001—how to grow? We brought them the expertise, logistics management, IT software etc," she explains. The company started doing this in 2003 and in the last three to four years they have partnered with eight to ten such organisations. Metropolis tied up with Lister and named it Lister Metropolis. They brought the expertise to them on how to manage, expand their collection centre, how to add more labs, how to expand their test menu, how to you draw more customers, how to market and how to build their brand equity. So Metropolis basically took these individual labs and expanded them in terms of infrastructure, operations, revenue, and profits, and the hard work put in is now reflecting. "From 2003 till 2007, Lister Metropolis has grown 300 percent," says Patel. Three times the size of what it was at that time. Simultaneously, they have also started direct Metropolis labs, and have in total 50 of them.

Besides they have also tied up with hospitals. And with respect to hospitals, Metropolis has two different ways to function. Firstly, the hospitals can outsource their routine testing to them so that they can be free of manpower and can have the latest technology and good quality results. The other way is that the hospitals would provide space to Metropolis to carry out testing in the hospital itself where Metropolis could train the hospital officials. This would help in improving the profitability, as well as quality. The company, besides doing the routine and specialised testing, is also into clinical research, where they provide two services—one being the central lab service where they provide pathology support to all the clinical trials in India as well as outside. And the second one in which they offer an SMO service. As clinical trials are being run rapidly, they need people to be actually present at the site, in the hospitals to monitor the trials. Currently, in their SMO division alone, they are running about 50-60 trials, and in the central lab division—another 50-60 trials. The company's organic growth has increased from 40 to 45 percent in the last one-year, with respect to sales, market, networking, etc. Inorganic growth is increasing in all major metro cities and other two tier to three tier cities. The company is also looking forward for the right opportunity to merge with other labs. Currently, Metropolis has twenty acquisitions, out of which, six have been closed and others are in process.

Setting apart

Conducting specialised tests, routine tests outsourcing, conducting clinical trials and SMO service, is what sets them apart. And due to the lack of such chains there is no intense competition as well. There are only three or four competitors and all are not national. So Metropolis differentiates itself from others by having a big network along with collection centres. It also has built up trust and credibility by bringing in renowned pathologists and doctors, which has brought along the comfort to doctors of not running to call up a pathologist and asking for any help whenever required. "So we make sure that every place we go and have a lab, there is a solid phase of Metropolis in that place which makes it comfortable. The second thing is that we are the only Indian lab chain, which is a multinational. they are present in Dubai, Sharjah, Colombo, South Africa, Cape Town and are also coming up with a lab in Thailand. There is no other Indian lab chain, which is a multinational.

Though all this did take a lot of efforts, ideas and hard work, there has not been any major challenge because unfortunately there are no regulations in pathology. Anybody can start a lab. Nobody can stop them. "It is very unfortunate because in that way you have a lot of different people who just decide to come into the field and do bad quality testing and the patients suffer. We will actually be happy if there will be some regulations," hopes Patel.

Deals in hand

After offloading around 20 percent stakes to ICICI ventures, the company is progressing on a deal with a UK based company, but it has not been finalised. "We are also bringing in a European radiology player into India with a JV," informs Patel. With this the company will get an entry in pathology in the European market and they will give the European company an opportunity here. Besides, Metropolis is also launching a green field project in Kolkata. They have set up a new lab there, equipped new people, infrastructure etc.

As a part of the CSR they have also tied up with multiple NGOs and government hospitals. In Mumbai itself they have six charitable collection centres. They also provide free testing and discounts on doctor's prescriptions. "So like this what we try and do in healthcare is that the government hospitals are not always in the best situation so we try and help out as private player wherever we can," says Patel.

Metropolis will also be spending around Rs 70-100 crore in the coming years in major parts of India, 75 percent would be focused in India and the rest 25 percent internationally. Returns on international business will grow bigger. Patel describes the long journey in numbers. "In 2001-02 we were Rs 9 crore now we are Rs 150 crore," In five years it's a multiplication of the hard work and the efforts that have gone in. If we did not have the brand equity of Metropolis it would never have been possible. So the full credit goes to Dr Shah. It is only that we got a younger team,” she signs off.

arshiya.khan@expressindia.com