How much do companies make on Outsourced Clinical Trials in India ?

We recently did research how big is the profit margin for Indian CROs or multinational CROs setting up offices in India. It was surprising to see the margins and painful to see how systematic the exploitation was in India.

A british pharmaceutical company pays the following amount in USD (converted to Indian Rupees) by each therapy area to an Indian CRO:

1. Cardiovascular : 5,000 - 7,000 USD/patient (2.8 lakhs Rs)

2. Oncology (failed treatments) : 20-25,000 USD/patient (10 lakhs Rs)

3. Safety trials (phase I) : 3,000-8,000 USD/patient (3.2 lakhs Rs)

Now comes the flip side : India has the luxury of having medical graduates working as CRAs and that too for a meagre 1.5 to 3 lakhs Rs per year. That translates to CROs having to just pay what they get on a single patient per year and have "cost-effective" manpower.

If India ever wishes to be professional and competitive companies have to learn to provide higher pay and development incentives. I am worried that clinical research industry is not learning enough from the IT industry. Come on guys for developing silly web pages people make more than a CRA today - its got to change.