Ishaan Khanna is the CEO and Executive Director of LifeCell International Pvt Ltd. He started as the Head of Strategy and Product Development and now holds the position of CEO. He completed his Master's in Biotechnology, Enterprise, Genetics, and Toxicology from the University of Manchester. He holds tremendous knowledge in his field.

Journey of CEO of LifeCell International

Ishaan Khanna says, “LifeCell International has been evolving since its inception. It is started off as being India’s first private cord blood bank. It has been evolving into multiple areas of healthcare. It is evolved into a leading mother and child healthcare provider of India. My journey started as being a healthcare provider and I am still on this journey as healthcare is a vast subject.

My journey is full of ups and downs with roller coaster rides. Working in cord bank and diagnostic is extremely great. It's high science and high tech. The scientific background that I have come from has given me the impetus to go and do something for the country. All people in the space of technology especially healthcare, always focus on how to get better for India. India’s market is huge with the number of children being born every year. We aim to get the best stem cell banking in the country. Today, I feel proud saying that we have been able to accomplish more than what we aimed for. "

Challenges in managing India’s first and largest stem cell bank

Ishaan Khanna informs, “We are India’s largest and 3 rd largest in the world stem cell banking organization. We started in 2005 and saved many babies and catered to a good number of families. We are leaders in this space with a 50 % market share in cord cell banking in India. The challenges we faced are-

Bring innovation Reach out to more parents  Adoptable for parents  Accessible to parents 

We have over 3.5 lac, babies, for stem cells with us and now the goal is much larger. The goal is to do lakhs of stem cell banking every month. The guidelines are still evolving with different bodies like ICMR. 

 Healthcare providers and patients connected so far 

Ishaan Khanna states, “Doctors play a critical role in this journey because expecting parents rely on doctors and specialists. We have 6k doctors in 200+ cities across the country. We also want people to meet their doctors regularly. We are tied with 6k medical professionals and are also into mother-baby care and many divisions at Lifecell

We have many medical institution tie-ups across the country which offer these services. It is a wide network with LifeCell and started with cord blood bank and evolved into diagnostics and now into many areas. We have catered to 6 lac + pregnancies."

USP of LifeCell International 

Ishaan Khanna informs, “This is the important question what many parents ask what should we choose and which is best for us. The biggest problem in India is the lack of access to stem cells. Genetic diversity also affects this. HLA typing is also important. We innovated the concept of community banking. In this community banking, we allow access to such a large pool. Today, over 95% of people who have stored their cord cells in our community bank have a high chance of finding a matching unit. If any parent has stored the stem cells with us and needs to find a matching unit, we can guarantee 90% availability for this. This concept has been adopted only by us and not by others. This community bank itself is a very clear differentiator of why people want to store their cord blood for the future. We are the largest community cord blood bank."

Funding for 2022  LifeCell International 

Ishaan Khanna says, “ The 1st round of funding had a major focus on the penetration of cord blood banking. We achieved the milestones set.  LifeCell International is a different company now and not just a cord blood bank. We have diagnostic set up as well which is growing rapidly to venture into newer areas as well. The idea of new fundings is to scale up the diagnostic business and also focus to improvise the further penetration of cord blood banking in India which is a very big goal. We are hoping the funds should sail us through and there are no immediate requirements for funds. 

Goals for 2022  LifeCell International 

Ishaan Khanna says, “ It started with a positive note for us with the funding this year. Our goals are very clear. We are going to look forward to making cord blood banking accessible to a maximum number of parents in the country and working towards various solutions around that. In diagnostic, the focus is we want to reach closer to our customers and expand our network across the country. We have 5 laboratories across the country and hoping to reach out to many more cities. We also hope to expand and go live mode in some areas which are under areas. Also, because of covid, there is a lot of sensitivity towards healthcare in India. People are talking about healthcare subjects. We have catered lakh of samples for govt and private companies. I am very glad that biotech and health tech is being talked about with equal passion. It is an exciting time for the healthcare space and we are very happy to be part of this ecosystem.”

(Edited by Dr.Rati Parwani)