Why Spice Group has renewed biz focus in India

Singapore-based Spice Group is keen to enhance investment in India.

The Singapore-based Spice Global group’s health care division is investing an additional Rs 300 crore (Rs 3 billion)  to double the capacity of its Saket City Hospital in Delhi.

Bhupendra Kumar Modi (below left), chairman of the $2-billion business empire, also known as ‘Joint Venture Modi’, tells Digbijay Mishra about his plan. Excerpts:  

What is the expansion plan for your Saket hospital?  

We are looking at a 600-bed hospital from the existing 230 beds, which will help us create new specialities.

We would invest an additional Rs 300 crore for this and should be ready by November 2017. So far, we have invested Rs 300 crore, making it a total investment of Rs 600 crore (Rs 6 billion).  

You had plans to enter pharma manufacturing. Anything coming on that front?  

That is something we are looking at separately. We are also looking at nutraceutrical and smart foods.  

You realigned your business verticals last year. What are the plans for each of these?  

The first is health care. We have got SaketCity, SmartHealthCity and Smart Living.

Then, in the education business, we are making a smart city. We have started a smart school in Modipur, where one can join after class XII for skill education.

We are doing halls and we look at entertainment as a very big area. Then, we have the finance vertical and mobility, the biggest by revenue.

If you look at valuation, the other businesses are equally at par.

For the past 10 years, I was focusing more outside India. Now, for two years, I am concentrating more on India.  

What is the trigger for starting to focus more on India?  

Basically, a change of environment. It is not only the government change. It is also that India’s image is going up every year.

When a new government comes, it has new ideas. I like this government because it is tech-oriented. Since I am a tech guy, I can relate to them.  

Where do you see your group in the years ahead?  

We have big hopes. We are hoping to do better every year and we will be announcing our group plans one by one before the Pravasi Bharati event next year.

I will keep everything ready and this is all in preparation for that. I will announce my next two movies and serials coupled with SmartHealthCity.  

Are you still pursuing plans to acquire an insurance company in India?  

I can only move as fast as the government allows me to. I was hoping to start a bank last year because if I do insurance, I will also do banking.

I wanted to do mobile banking and had given a proposal. I could have run my bank with less than 200 people.  

Any plans for e-commerce?  

We are already there; it is part of our software business. Since things are changing fast, we are getting each vertical’s plan and by the end of the year, we can come up with a composite plan for e-commerce.  

What’s the broader outlook for your health  care business?  

We have Philips as a knowledge partner. When we got here initially, we had the latest technology and now when we are adding capacity, we are getting the latest technology again.

With additional capacity, we have to deal with a larger number of patients across day care, diagnosis segments…We are looking at oncology, for example.

The sector is so big that everyone is here to strive and thrive but the ratio will change eventually.  

How has the business done so far?  

We have already done about $25 million and that is because our capacity utilisation is not full. Within these 230 beds, we should be $50 million in two years. Naturally, that will further increase when we get 600 beds operational.