The government is preparing to officially launch the Promotion of Research and Innovation in Pharma MedTech (PRIP) scheme this month to foster innovation in the pharmaceutical and medical technology sectors, according to Amit Agrawal, Secretary of the Department of Pharmaceuticals (DoP).
The scheme, notified on August 17, 2023, carries a financial outlay of ₹5,000 crore, with ₹4,250 crore allocated to strengthening R&D investments in the sector.
“We are focusing in a very big way now on innovation in India. So we have a scheme (PRIP) which was announced some time ago, but we hope to launch that scheme within this month,” Agrawal said at the Asia Pacific Medical Technology Association (APACMed) event.
He added that the scheme will provide balanced support for both the pharma and medtech segments and could offer funding at both early and late stages.
Agrawal further explained that the scheme will cover 35% to 50% of project costs, depending on the stage and nature of the proposal.
“We are also looking at deepening the ability in the ecosystem to produce critical raw materials and critical components which are needed to deepen the value footprint within India, which will help it make more business sense to really locate production within India,” he noted.
Agrawal highlighted that the medtech industry has maintained double-digit growth over the past 15 years, and this momentum is expected to continue for decades. He also mentioned that three medical device parks are under development and should become operational by early 2027.
“They are all expected to be functional sometime by early 2027, and that will give us a good space... And in the next version of the scheme, we are planning to build more specialised facilities for those medical grade materials locally available, so that will give us a scale,” Agrawal stated.
Anupriya Patel, Minister of State for Health, described the medical technology sector as a sunrise industry, noting that the Government of India has introduced several policy measures to support its growth.
She added that domestic manufacturing has been rising steadily alongside increasing exports.
“Today India is transforming into a high volume and high value player in the global medtech market,” the minister stated.