Amitabh Dube FUTURE PHARMA

Novartis India's president and MD on his belief that Al can lead to faster diagnosis, the tussle between access and innovation, and his love for Vietnam

- Arun Janardhan

It's a coincidence, says Amitabh Dube, country president and managing director of pharmaceutical company Novartis India, that his son's name is Abhishek.

"It was only later that we realised that, oh, we missed Jaya and Aishwarya in the family," he adds, grinning, in reference to the famous family in films.

At the Chambers, on the 25th floor of the Taj Land's End in Mumbai, Dube is seated with his back to the large glass windows that face the ocean. The once uncluttered view of the sea, now diminished by the building blocks of an upcoming addition to the bridge over the sea, is still spectacular, though such a view is, ironically, rare in a city by the coast. "We are a family of four 'mads'," he says, referring to wife Anupama and daughter Avantika, who is headed to Singapore for an MBA, and how they all have the same initials (with honorifics).

The 55-year-old, wearing a dark jacket and round glasses, has spent a lifetime in the volatile, complex world of the pharmaceutical industry. India is a major producer of generic medicines, vaccines and affordable drugs, working in a strong regulatory framework that tries to balance cost-effectiveness with quality. It's the world's third largest pharmaceutical industry by volume, accounting for 20% of the global supply of generic drugs, according to data from the government's department of pharmaceuticals.

Novartis has roughly a hundred active clinical trials for new drugs running in India, with 2,500 plus patients enrolled

"I'm optimistic that next five years are going to be different from an access and landscape perspective," says Dube. "There's more receptiveness towards hearing an idea, and there's also strong execution. Over a period of time, we'll have more scope of coverage, a balance for innovative industry to flourish and a strong presence of the generic."