5 GCCs Driving Pharma and Healthcare Innovation
Over 15% of all global capability centre (GCC) employees in India are involved in the healthcare and life sciences sector, reflecting the sector’s growing importance within the country’s global services landscape, according to recent reports. Moreover, a significant share—over 55%—of these GCCs are backed by US-headquartered companies, underlining the sector’s strong international roots. Geographically, around 85% of healthcare and Life Sciences GCCs are concentrated in four major hubs: Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Mumbai, and Delhi-NCR. Bengaluru leads with nearly 33% of the total centres, followed closely by Hyderabad and Mumbai. Notably, around 20% of these centres have expanded their footprint across three or more cities, signalling a trend towards multi-city operations. Hyderabad, in particular, has recently emerged as a rising star in this sector, driven by attractive government incentives, modern infrastructure, and a rich talent pool. Some of the top companies based on GCCs headcount in India are Novartis, Pfizer, Abbott, Siemens Healthineers, and Eli Lilly. AIM is hosting the most powerful GCC event, MachineCon GCC Summit 2025, from June 20 to 22, 2025, at the ITC Grand in Goa. Novartis Over the past two decades, Novartis’ development hub in India has grown significantly, now operating three advanced centres across two major cities. In Hyderabad, the company has a strong presence at both the Novartis Corporate Centre and Genome Valley, while a newer centre has been established in Mumbai. These centres play a key role in supporting the development of breakthrough medicines across a wide range of therapy areas, including cardiovascular, oncology, immunology, neurology, and global health. The India hub supports several global functions such as global clinical operations, technical R&D, patient safety and pharmacovigilance, regulatory affairs, and advanced quantitative sciences, among others. For over 12 years, Novartis has steadily expanded its technical R&D operations in Genome Valley. Today, more than 350 highly qualified scientists—including master’s, PhDs, and post-doctorates—are actively contributing to the pharmaceutical development of new chemical entities. With a team of around 2,400 employees across its development division in India, this hub plays a vital role in driving Novartis’ long-term growth and advancing its mission to improve and extend people’s lives. Pfizer Over the decades, Pfizer has introduced many of its global, breakthrough treatments across major therapeutic areas while also building one of India’s most recognised local brand portfolios, benefiting millions of patients and consumers. Pfizer operates in India through three legal entities: Pfizer Limited, Pfizer Products India Private Ltd, and Pfizer Healthcare India Private Limited. Across these entities, more than 5,500 colleagues are engaged in commercial operations, global manufacturing, R&D, and other functions—all united in Pfizer’s mission to prevent, treat, and cure some of the most pressing health challenges facing India and the world. Pfizer’s footprint in India includes three manufacturing plants, two R&D centres, and six regional hubs for commercial operations and global support functions. Pfizer Healthcare operates a world-class sterile injectables manufacturing facility in Visakhapatnam, Andhra Pradesh—one of Pfizer’s largest of its kind globally. This plant supplies critical medicines to over 30 countries. In Chennai, Pfizer Healthcare also runs a state-of-the-art R&D centre focused on small molecules. The centre employs top scientific talent and plays a key role in global research, development, and technical support for the commercial manufacturing of parenteral products. Abbott Established in 1910, Abbott India is a publicly listed company and a subsidiary of Abbott Laboratories. Headquartered in Mumbai, the company has a workforce of over 14,000 and deep-rooted local expertise. It is committed to meeting the healthcare needs of consumers, patients, healthcare professionals, hospitals, blood banks, and laboratories across urban and rural India. As a market leader in pharmaceuticals, nutrition, medical devices, and diagnostics, Abbott offers a broad and trusted portfolio. This includes more than 400 pharmaceutical brands, a wide range of nutritional products tailored for infants, children, active adults, and individuals with special dietary needs, and advanced medical devices such as blood glucose monitors and vascular solutions. In addition, Abbott provides comprehensive diagnostic tools that support timely and accurate healthcare delivery. Siemens Healthineers The Development Centre at Siemens Healthineers in India functions as a microcosm of the global organisation, complete with an extensive laboratory setup. The company takes pride in the fact that nearly every product or solution it delivers has roots in India, with the Development Centre playing a central role in its creation and maintaining full ownership of the development process. In key areas such as CT, MRI, and molecular imaging, the India team contributes significantly to both scanner development and post-processing technologies. Moreover, the team plays a vital role in artificial intelligence initiatives, handling essential tasks such as data mining, annotation, and other related activities. Siemens Healthineers has a long-standing manufacturing presence in India, producing medical devices for over 60 years. As part of its continued commitment to innovation and growth, the company is investing €160 million (approximately ₹1,300 crore) in expanding its Development Centre in Bengaluru, which is scheduled to open this year. With a workforce of around 7,000 employees in India, Siemens Healthineers credits this team with having a profound impact on its global innovation pipeline—so much so that today, every product from Siemens Healthineers is said to have “India inside”. Eli Lilly Eli Lilly and Company established the Lilly Capability Centre India (LCCI) in 2016 as a cross-functional hub designed to harness the power of data, content, analytics, and technology. Located in Bengaluru, the centre serves as a strategic partner to support Lilly’s global operations and drive innovation. Currently employing 3,372 people in India, Eli Lilly is expanding its presence with the launch of a second capability centre in Hyderabad. The new facility, also named Lilly Capability Centre India (LCCI) Hyderabad, will focus on cutting-edge areas such as automation, artificial intelligence, software engineering, and cloud computing. The Hyderabad centre is being developed to strengthen Lilly’s global capabilities by enhancing efficiency and accelerating the development of next-generation medicines through advanced technologies and data-driven insights. Recruitment for the new centre is already underway, with plans to onboard between 1,000 and 1,500 professionals, including technology engineers and data scientists.
Around 20% of these centres have expanded their footprint across three or more cities, signalling a trend towards multi-city operations.
Around 20% of these centres have expanded their footprint across three or more cities, signalling a trend towards multi-city operations. 
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["AI", "artificial intelligence", "analytics", "Aim", "cloud computing", "R", "Go", "Rust", "GAN", "ViT"]
Shalini is a senior tech journalist, exploring the latest advancements in AI. When she's not reporting on the latest innovations, you can find her immersed in her next literary adventure.