Global Capability Centres (GCCs) have undergone a profound transformation in recent years, evolving from back-office cost centres to integral hubs of innovation and operational excellence within the life sciences industry. Nowhere is this shift more apparent than in India, and particularly in Bengaluru, which has emerged as a pivotal nerve-centre for the life sciences sector on a global scale. An EY analysis published in September underscores this metamorphosis: approximately half of the world’s top life-sciences firms have established GCCs in India, with over twenty marquee names having either arrived or expanded their operations in the country during the past five years alone. This influx signals a decisive recalibration not merely of geography but of the strategic role these centres play in pharmaceutical and biotech R&D and commercialisation efforts.
The mandates entrusted to GCCs have moved well beyond traditional, lower-value functions such as basic data processing or administrative support. Today, these centres are entrusted with critical tasks that bear directly on the development, approval, and lifecycle management of therapeutics and medical devices. They manage pharmacovigilance the continuous monitoring of drug safety post-market alongside real-world evidence analytics, which integrate clinical trial data with patient outcomes in everyday medical practice to inform regulatory and commercial decisions. Furthermore, GCCs are spearheading digital therapeutics development, a burgeoning field that combines software and clinical science to deliver novel treatment modalities. Most notably, artificial intelligence (AI)-assisted discovery workflows are now a growing feature of their remit, with machine learning (ML) algorithms accelerating target identification, biomarker discovery, and predictive modelling. This transition from cost arbitrage to competence centre represents a fundamental shift in how global pharmaceutical companies engage with their Indian operations, reflecting a mature understanding of the country’s unique value proposition.
The operating model underpinning these GCCs is rapidly evolving to accommodate their increasingly sophisticated functions. The traditional boundaries between disciplines are dissolving: biostatisticians collaborate closely with ML engineers to design predictive models that integrate clinical data with emerging real-world insights. Clinicians are embedded within data annotation teams, ensuring that ontologies the structured vocabularies that underpin data interoperability reflect both scientific nuance and regulatory precision. Quality assurance professionals are tasked with crafting audit trails robust enough to satisfy the stringent requirements of regulatory agencies such as the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the European Medicines Agency (EMA). This multidisciplinary integration is a hallmark of the new GCC paradigm, and it is facilitated by the creation of innovation ecosystems within Indian life sciences hubs like Bengaluru and Hyderabad. These cities now host global centres for major pharmaceutical firms, creating corridors of expertise and knowledge exchange that are less “spokes” and more interconnected “networks.” For instance, a leading French life sciences company recently doubled its Indian headcount to expand clinical documentation and data science capabilities, signalling confidence in the country’s ability to deliver at the highest levels.
Several factors underpin India’s ascendancy as a GCC hub in life sciences, among which the well-known trifecta of talent, time-zone advantage, and regulatory environment remains paramount. India boasts a vast pool of highly educated scientific and technical talent, graduating hundreds of thousands of STEM professionals annually. This talent pipeline is complemented by the country’s geographic position, which allows companies to operate on a near-24-hour cycle by leveraging time-zone differences with Europe and North America. Beyond these fundamentals, India’s regulatory framework has adapted to the complexities of life sciences innovation, distinguishing between software solutions and scientific products. This nuanced understanding is critical in digital therapeutics and AI applications, where regulatory pathways remain complex and evolving globally. India’s regulators have shown increasing sophistication in this regard, creating an environment that supports innovation without compromising patient safety.
India’s growing capabilities in life sciences GCCs dovetail with significant government and industry investments in hardware and policy frameworks designed to strengthen the entire biomedical value chain. The Indian Semiconductor Mission, for example, is aggressively promoting the development of power semiconductors and advanced packaging technologies relevant to medical devices. Improved med-tech hardware reliability is a direct beneficiary of these efforts, enabling the country to move beyond software and data services into manufacturing and device innovation. Simultaneously, the government’s Production Linked Incentive (PLI) scheme is fostering the creation of plants with Good Manufacturing Practice (GMP) certification, critical for scaling up pharmaceutical production while ensuring quality compliance. These developments effectively shorten the lag between clinical protocol design and product roll-out, enabling Indian GCCs to function as seamless conduits from discovery to commercialization.
These advances are not without challenges. Talent churn the inevitable movement of skilled professionals between companies and sectors remains a persistent risk, as does intellectual property (IP) discipline in an environment where collaboration and innovation must be balanced with confidentiality. Regulatory whiplash, or sudden changes in compliance requirements, can disrupt ongoing projects and increase costs. Life sciences multinationals are addressing these risks through strategic measures such as long-tenor leases on office spaces to ensure operational stability, captive training academies to continuously upskill employees, and joint governance models with headquarters to maintain alignment on standards and protocols. These interventions signal a shift towards treating GCCs not as cost centres but as strategic assets integral to the global innovation ecosystem.
Looking forward, the co-location of GCCs with device parks, contract research organisations (CROs), and manufacturing clusters could unlock unprecedented synergies in India’s life sciences landscape. In such integrated ecosystems, preclinical laboratories, clinical trial management teams, and manufacturing units would be physically proximate, enabling rapid iteration and feedback loops. This proximity offers an advantage rarely seen elsewhere: the ability to move from bench to bedside within a short taxi ride. Such integration transcends traditional outsourcing models, which typically fragment the R&D lifecycle across disparate geographies, and instead embodies true operating leverage where the sum of parts creates exponential value. India’s life sciences GCCs are thus poised not only to support global pharmaceutical firms but to reshape the architecture of drug discovery, development, and delivery themselves.
The broader impact of this shift extends beyond multinational corporations. Indian biotech startups and domestic pharmaceutical firms are increasingly leveraging the GCC ecosystem to access cutting-edge technologies and global markets. Bengaluru, with its established IT and life sciences clusters, serves as an incubator for innovation, where startups collaborate with GCCs on AI algorithms for drug discovery, digital health platforms, and advanced analytics. This cross-pollination accelerates the maturation of India’s life sciences sector, reducing reliance on foreign technology and enhancing indigenous capabilities. Moreover, the proliferation of digital therapeutics and AI-assisted workflows has the potential to democratize healthcare access by enabling scalable, personalized treatment solutions. As these technologies mature within India’s GCCs, they may help address endemic healthcare challenges domestically and in other emerging markets.
International investors and policy-makers have taken note of India’s accelerating momentum. The country’s life sciences GCCs are increasingly featured in global innovation indices and attract significant foreign direct investment (FDI). The Indian government’s strategic vision articulated in policy documents such as the National Bio-Economy Strategy emphasises the importance of creating infrastructure, fostering talent, and streamlining regulation to position India as a global bio-manufacturing and R&D powerhouse. These initiatives complement private sector investments and signal a long-term commitment to sustaining India’s GCC leadership. The combination of scale, capability, and regulatory maturity offered by Indian GCCs provides a compelling case for life sciences companies seeking to optimise their global footprint in an era defined by rapid technological change and complex supply chain demands.
In sum, India’s life sciences GCCs have transcended their original function as low-cost service providers to become sophisticated centres of excellence that integrate data science, clinical expertise, and manufacturing innovation. Bengaluru stands at the heart of this transformation, hosting a vibrant ecosystem where biostatisticians, AI engineers, clinicians, and quality experts collaborate seamlessly. Supported by government initiatives, industrial tie-ins, and a regulatory framework attuned to emerging technologies, India is charting a new course in the global life sciences landscape. The result is a model of “bench to bedside” innovation that offers unprecedented speed, quality, and agility an operating leverage that promises to reshape how new therapies and medical technologies reach patients worldwide.
GCC hub status: ~23 of top-50 global life-sciences firms now operate GCCs in India; mandates moving up the value chain.
From cost to competence: PV, RWE, digital therapeutics and AI-assisted discovery mature in-country.
Industrial tie-ins: ISM semiconductors + PLI plants tighten the lab-to-factory loop.