Andhra Med Tech Zone (AMTZ) — a company established by the government in the Indian state of Andhra Pradesh — has received the formal registration that will kick-start establishing Asia’s first dedicated medical-device park.

Located in 226 acres at Visakhapatnam, the park will have all the facilities required to ensure optimised manufacturing costs, including specialised laboratories, warehousing and testing centres, as well as
100-150 independent manufacturing units.

Medical-device development and manufacturing requires certain high-cost facilities that are too capital-intensive for individual manufacturers to justify, but a park with in-house ‘high-investment’ scientific facilities could help manufacturers reduce the cost of manufacturing by as much as 50% — or possibly more.

The centrally located common facilities as proposed by AMTZ will support the manufacture of high-end medical devices aimed not only at import substitution but also at creating export opportunities.

India’s medical-device industry is worth about $9 billion; the country’s import bill for this segment is about $3.45 billion, so a dedicated medical-device park would significantly reduce import dependency and increase exports (currently a little over $1 billion), while generating wealth and employment.