The ascendency of India as an economic world power

India is the land of outsourcing. American and European companies outsource their works to India to save money and become more profitable. Until now, we have seen outsourcing jobs flowing to India mainly in the Information Technology sector. Most probably, we will see a boom in the Clinical Trials sector as far as outsourcing to India is concerned. Cutting Edge Information has stated that outsourcing clinical trials to India can be highly profitable for western companies. I found a press release in this regard.

Here is the press release:

According to a

recent report by pharmaceutical business intelligence leader Cutting Edge Information, outsourcing clinical operations to India can have considerable advantages including significant cost savings compared to US clinical trials.

In the report, "Clinical Operations: Accelerating Trials, Allocating Resources and Measuring Performance" (http://www.ClinicalTrialBenchmarking.com), India is highlighted as not only offering cost-savings, but also providing a large, diverse population which can accelerate the patient recruitment process and condense overall

trial timelines. In addition, a large percentage of Indian patients have not previously taken medication for their ailments, which eliminates the factor of potentially slowing trial times or impacting results.

The Indian government is also taking steps to encourage the outsourcing of clinical trials to its country. In the fall of 2003, India removed several regulatory hurdles to performing clinical trials and in 2005 it adopted more stringent patent processes that closely resemble those of the US and other Western countries.

"As recruiting, enrolling, and randomizing patients in the US becomes increasingly time-consuming, large portions of clinical work will continue to be outsourced overseas," says Jon Hess, research team leader and lead author of Cutting Edge Information's clinical development report. "India provides an economical location, an abundant patient population, and a large pool of physicians and nurses that speak English - all of which make the country a very attractive outsourcing opportunity."

 "Clinical Operations: Accelerating Trials, Allocating Resources and Measuring Performance" (http://www.ClinicalTrialBenchmarking.com) also includes an array of clinical trial data, including the following:

    -- Per-patient clinical trial costs by therapeutic area and development phase

    -- Percentage of clinical trial budgets outsourced by therapeutic area and        development phase

    -- Trial staffing data covering more than 10 therapeutic areas and a dozen        functions/roles

    -- Surveyed companies' actual and target clinical trial performance

       measures

    -- Clinical trial cycle time metrics

 So, another good news for India. We will have to wait another few months about the impact of this report. Well, if you ask me then my answer is that outsourcing is an inevitable process.