In an interview with Manish Kothari, Senior Vice President at Silicon Labs, key insights emerge on the technologies and ecosystem partnerships shaping the future of India’s MedTech sector. The discussion highlights the importance of early access to advanced embedded systems, wireless connectivity, and edge AI technologies in helping startups develop globally competitive medical devices. It also explores how collaborations between industry, academia, and innovators can accelerate indigenous healthcare innovation, reduce dependence on imports, and strengthen India’s medical device ecosystem. Further, the conversation examines the growing impact of wearables, intelligent sensors, IoT-enabled healthcare solutions, and edge machine learning in improving accessibility, diagnostics, and patient outcomes, while outlining the critical steps required for India to become a global hub for medical device innovation and manufacturing.
Read the full interview here:
EB: Why is early access to advanced embedded systems and wireless technologies important for Indian medical device startups aiming to compete globally?
Manish Kothari: Early access to advanced embedded systems and wireless technologies is critical because the technology decisions made at the design stage largely determine a medical device’s performance, power efficiency, security, scalability, and readiness for regulatory approval. When startups have access, they can build products that are architecturally robust and globally competitive, rather than spending valuable time and resources retrofitting technologies later in the development cycle.
Through our collaboration with CfHE at IIT Hyderabad, we are providing startups with early access to Silicon Labs’ energy-efficient wireless MCUs with edge-ML capabilities, advanced chipsets, and IoT-enabled development platforms. Combined with hands-on workshops and expert technical guidance, this support helps accelerate product development, shorten learning cycles, and enable innovators to bring secure, connected healthcare solutions to market faster.
EB: How can collaborations between global technology companies, academia, and startups help reduce India’s dependence on imported medical devices?
Manish Kothari: Reducing dependence on imported medical devices requires a strong innovation ecosystem where technology providers, academia, and startups work together to accelerate the development of foundational capabilities. Each stakeholder plays a distinct role. Academic institutions contribute research and domain expertise, startups bring agility and innovation, and global technology companies provide access to advanced technologies, technical know-how, and industry best practices.
At Silicon Labs, we believe that enabling innovators with access to cutting-edge semiconductor platforms at an early stage can significantly shorten development cycles and improve product readiness.This not only helps accelerate the development of smart medical devices designed and manufactured in India, but also strengthens the country’s capability to build secure, reliable, and globally competitive healthcare technologies.
EB: Which emerging technologies—wearables, edge diagnostics, AI, or IoT healthcare devices—are likely to have the biggest impact on India’s healthcare sector and why?
Manish Kothari: There are advances in several technologies and technology areas that are increasingly prominent in the healthcare sector – sensors, computing, communication, AI, and edge ML
Nanotechnology has enabled new age sensors built with nanomaterials that detect disease biomarkers at the molecular level, and improve sensitivity by orders of magnitude, providing for early detection, fast diagnostics and even offer targeted drug delivery. Multimodal sensors combine data from multiple sources and provide for advanced detection and personalized diagnostics. A lot of sensing is moving to non-invasive mode, enabling greater proliferation of medical wearables.
Advanced sensors also bring in a need for high complexity computing – often using AI for analysing and interpreting combined data from multiple sources. Currently a lot of the AI based analysis is carried out on remote servers and that is likely to continue. However, edge-ML offers specific advantages in terms of low latency of response, longer battery life of devices, the ability to take critical decisions even in the absence of wider connectivity, and the option of reducing data transfer overload. ML inference at the edge would need hardware accelerators for quick processing as well as for lowering energy consumption – like what Silicon Labs’ devices provide.
The most popular connectivity methods for healthcare devices are Wi-Fi and Bluetooth. Both protocols are evolving to handle new requirements and provide more capability. Wi-Fi is providing longer battery life for edge devices, greater reliability in crowded environments, and more seamless connectivity in large scale enterprise deployments, among others. Bluetooth has been adding new functionality and supported use cases like accurate location determination and mesh networking.
Innovative startups, a strong entrepreneurship support system, emerging technology, and ecosystem partnership – all this is helping make real impact on the Indian healthcare sector. Better healthcare is now more accessible and affordable. It has a wider reach into remote areas, and is mitigating a skewed doctor-patient ratio in rural and urban locations. Early diagnoses, a wider spread of preventive medicine, and removal of linguistic barriers through AI are all helping reduce the strain on the existing healthcare infrastructure.
EB: What are the biggest challenges startups face in moving medical devices from prototype to real-world healthcare deployment?
Manish Kothari: Moving from a prototype to real-world healthcare deployment is often one of the most challenging stages for medical device startups. Beyond developing a functional product, startups must ensure that their devices are reliable, secure, scalable, and capable of meeting regulatory requirements while performing effectively in diverse healthcare environments.
Equally important is access to the right technology foundation, technical expertise, and real-world validation opportunities. While a prototype may perform well in the lab, successful deployment requires reliability, robust operation over a long term, security, efficient connectivity, and readiness for regulatory requirements. By supporting startups with advanced semiconductor technologies, technical guidance, and pilot deployment opportunities, we can help accelerate the transition from innovation to scalable healthcare solutions.
EB: How can Indian MedTech startups balance innovation, affordability, security, and regulatory compliance while building connected healthcare devices?
Manish Kothari: Balancing innovation, affordability, security, and regulatory compliance starts with making the right design decisions early in the development process. These priorities should not be viewed as competing objectives but as essential requirements for building successful healthcare solutions.
By leveraging advanced, energy-efficient semiconductor technologies and secure IoT platforms from the outset, startups can develop connected medical devices that deliver innovative capabilities while maintaining reliability, security, and scalability. Equally important is validating these solutions in real-world healthcare environments and designing them to meet regulatory requirements from the beginning rather than as an afterthought.
Ultimately, the most successful MedTech innovations will be those that combine technological advancement with affordability and accessibility, ensuring they can deliver meaningful impact across diverse healthcare settings.
EB: What will it take for India to become a global hub for medical device innovation and manufacturing?
Manish Kothari: Becoming a global hub for medical device innovation requires more than policy ambition, it demands a functioning ecosystem where research, technology, capital, and manufacturing capability reinforce each other. India has the foundational ingredients such as a strong talent base, a growing startup ecosystem, and increasing focus on deep-tech entrepreneurship. The next step is to strengthen collaboration between industry, academia, and innovators to accelerate the translation of research into commercially viable healthcare solutions.
When global technology companies invest in India’s innovation ecosystem, not just as a market, but as a design and development partner, they bring with them semiconductor platforms, technical expertise, and global standards that domestic startups would otherwise spend years accessing independently. When that is combined with strong academic infrastructure and government initiatives focused on domestic manufacturing, the conditions for a genuine hub begin to take shape. The goal isn’t to replicate what other countries have built, it’s to leverage India’s unique advantages to build medical devices that are globally competitive in quality, designed for affordability at scale, and validated in one of the world’s most complex healthcare environments.
