Mr. Ramanathan – India, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh & Nepal
Ram has 30 years of experience in the Medical Equipment’s, Medical Devices and Diagnostics space within Healthcare. The major part of this experience has been around building up markets and businesses for leading companies in the South Asian markets. Ram has been involved in introduction of several new technologies in this region. He has worked with direct sales, after sales service, inside sales, variants of distribution both in product and service models of business. He has been part of start-ups (self & others) medium sized and large global organisations.
In his tenure Ram had the opportunity to work with diverse customer groups like large corporate hospitals, public hospitals as well as individual run medium sized hospitals hence understand the dynamics of the market and the decision makers in this region. Also during the course of his career had opportunity to understand the medical science behind several specialities and sub specialities of medicine.
Ram is currently part of India’s first Molecular Diagnostics technology start up funded by Indian HNIs and Fidelity Growth Partners. This technology is a paradigm shift from the conventional option. As a CEO of this start-up Ram has the responsibility of commercialising this service model of business from the scratch. This long haul journey involves creating customer acceptance, building teams, sustainability and scalability.
Earlier to this Ram was the Business Unit Director of Medication Delivery portfolio which had around 150+ sales and marketing personnel generating revenue of US$ 50M. Ram inherited a business which was negative in its P&L and over a period of 2.5 years not only managed a turnaround but also built momentum for strong growth on revenue and profitability. One half of the business was under government administered price control and hence under severe loss. Understanding the markets, optimising distribution models and a firm pulse over the price elasticity helped turn the P&L apart from Government liaison and implementing appropriate organisational structure. The other part had to work with regulatory approvals and introduction of new products in the subcontinent. Designing and developing marketing strategies, marked development initiatives helped build revenue and profitability. In this role Ram was involved in strategic sourcing of finished products as well as for augmenting manufacturing capacities. In addition several B2B opportunities with reputed International was scaled up during Ram’s leadership.
Earlier to Baxter, Ram worked on his own start-up in the consulting space with the primary intend of helping mid-sized European and US healthcare organisations start their operations
In India; from Market Sizing, Competitive Analysis, Regulatory processes to designing appropriate models of business were some of the key services offered by his boutique business development consulting company, Biz Mindsmith.
Before BizMindsmith, Ram was heading the Indian operation of Karl Storz as its Country Manager. The key task was to design business operations which can help increase market penetration of Karl Storz endoscopic technologies. A new distribution model different from the conventional ‘stock and sell’ distributor was implemented apart from developing competencies across the organisation. Contract manufacturing and after sales service as a profit centre were initiated to support the vision of the company. Karl Storz Indian operation turned profitable under Ram’s leadership. Also strategic marketing alliances with reputed pharma companies helped the brand mitigate strong competitive actions.
When Boston Scientific Indian operation was formed in 1997, Ram was one of the first members on board. For around 10 years at Boston Scientific, Ram built markets for new technologies in Endoscopy, Urology, Neuro Radiology for the Indian as well as Sri Lankan, Bangladesh and Nepal markets. Rapid growth with ethical base was the key operating guideline which Ram and his team was able to exceed expectations year after year. Ram was involved in training of his team members to raise them to subject matter experts (SME) to help them succeed in their efforts to build customer awareness and conversions.
Prior to Boston Scientific, Ram was part of Stryker and Advanced Technology Labs (ATL).
With an extensive medical distribution network and contacts across India, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Nepal, amongst various other stake holders of the Healthcare ecosystem, Ram brings in-depth knowledge and practical wisdom of accessing and developing markets enabling success in the market place across this region. He leads VISION’s team across this region constantly driving successful commercialisation of new products to markets for our clients.