Doctors prescribe medicines to the patients, but may do so by accepting incentives or bribes from the pharma companies. It is in the interest of the patients to break this nexus. The recent case where a paracetamol preparation was prescribed of a particular company in the treatment of Covid19 has revived this debate. The existing regulations are ineffective when it comes to control this nexus.

There are provisions of the MCI (Professional Conduct Etiquette and Ethics) Regulations, 2016. These discourage accepting commissions from pharma companies. However, very few doctors follow these provisions. Despite the punitive measures recommended ranging from censure to suspension from medical registers for 3 months to a year, there is no effective curb on the nexus.

There are voluntary codes (say Uniform Code of Pharmaceutical Marketing Practice – VCPMP, 2015) which too are ignored.

In the most common and harmless form, it consists of sending practitioners branded stationery, calendars or desk knick-knacks to keep their products on top of the mind in a crowded market. Pharma companies have adopted innovative ways of incentivising — from e-retail vouchers to car loan EMIs. They rope in even medical practitioners from alternative therapies to promote allopathic products. The doctors are paid travel bills to attend medical conferences or given fees to act as investigators on clinical trials or in endorsing key research papers. The MRs of pharma companies have little or no knowledge of the regulatory codes.

Ultimately, the patients bear the cost of treatment. Besides they face risks to life, health and efficacy of therapy. Most health expenditure is from the pocket of the patients, and not from insurance. The collusion of doctors and pharma companies is to be seen in this context.

Regulations do require a re-look to break this nexus. It is to be defined what constitutes considerations in exchange for promoting drugs. You cannot plug all possible cases of considerations but some specific qualifiers can be spelled out to prevent abuse. The whole thing just cannot be voluntary. The Pharma companies must be made accountable for giving inducements to doctors. The Centre has to give the matter a serious thought. Laws cannot act as strong deterrent.

All browsers are vulnerable, and must be updated and patched — Googles Chrome, older versions of Apple’s iOs, and some versions of Android.

Chrome happens to be the most widely used browser — almost 65 per cent internet users use it. It covers two thirds of net banking, trading and financial activities.

Edge of MS has been used as a default browser by a few. Android has the highest share in mobile market, and Apple’s iOS stands next to it, say 27-28 per cent. Safari commands a share of 19 per cent.

Google has released security fixes for Chrome. Some apps are directly loaded from a website, without downloading. Chrome fails to validate security on such apps. It is called Exploit in the Wild. Some hacker somewhere finds this vulnerability and exploits it.

There is cunning misuse of memory called use after free. Programming allocates portions of dynamic memory — RAM — for their own use. On such portions, they store data or code . However, when such portion is not needed, the memory there gets freed. In a use after free bug, the programme is led to believe that it is still using free portion of memory. A cunning hacker sneaks in a malicious code or fraudulent data in that address. It misleads the programme. A banking software can be led to transfer cash to abc account by exploiting the use after free bugs.

Apple’s vulnerabilities occur in iOS, MacOS and iPad. These are vulnerable to remote code execution.

The users must continuously update, and plug the gaps. Updating makes you safer, but complete safety is a chimera on internet. Researchers spot the vulnerabilities. Ethical hackers are encouraged to report these, and rewarded for it. However, the benefits of hacking far outweigh the benefits of rewards.

Digital advertising globally will touch a staggering figure of a trillion dollars by 2026-27. Digitisation in advertising has sneaked in so rapidly that 60 per cent plus of the total advertising market is already digital; and could reach 75 per cent globally. Thus even in India, digital is most likely to be the largest medium even by 2025.

Such drastic change makes it necessary to obtain a holistic view of the consumer. Big Tech maintains their own walled gardens of consumer data. It is an incomplete view of the consumer. Marketers come across a stumbling block to assess concrete real-time information.

To address this there should be a combination of adtech, martech and deeptech collectively called madtech. It is a platform of platforms, e.g. ReBid. A worldwide unified advertising and marketing platform can be built . This platform will provide access to consumers across the walled gardens. The volume of data that will flow through this platform will require automation. It is going to be an end-to-end platform. There are experiments to create such a platform.

Platform-driven advertising avails of a variety of tools, software, AI and ML to make this automatic to provide a holistic view of the consumers to the marketers and advertisers. These individual tools must be further augmented.

Dinosaur-like old agencies will perish, and nimble tech friendly platforms will take over.

Quantum computing is a few years away from powering real commercial applications. Organisations are optimistic about its potential and have launched proof of concepts (PoCs). The interest in the technology has increased and there are breakthroughs in technologies. There are improvements in quantum hardware, algorithms and techniques to accelerate the conventional technology models.

Quantum computers solve the problems previously thought intractable by manipulating particle physics of atoms, photons and electrons. There is exponential speed-up as compared to the best supercomputers. The communication becomes secure. The measurements are too fast and too precise. The collectivity of these is called quantum advantage which you score over classical systems in use now.

Capgemini, a French IT company, has set up Q-Lab in India to harness the potential of quantum technologies. It aims to become a leading quantum integrator globally. It is not necessary to wait for the technology to mature before adopting it. Its use must be explored by examining use cases and by finding skill gaps. Organisations have to be quantum-ready, which is a long journey.

A five-step approach is adopted by Capgemini to invest in quantum technology. One must harness the quantum advantage as soon as it appears. There should be assessment for quantum investment. A small team of experts must be constituted. The team translates the potential use cases to small quantum experiments to avail of the quantum advantage. Long-term partnerships must be made with technology providers. And in-house skills must be developed.

The areas of quantum applications could be aerospace, energy, chemicals and medicines and life sciences.

Modelling

Models are designed using applied engineering and technological skills and skills in basic sciences such as physics and chemistry. A real-life boiler’s model can be created virtually or a real-life plant’s model can be digitally created. Models can be made of aircraft engines, and power plants.

Such digital replicas are tested by simulation to see whether they meet the performance expectations of the original design. There could be a deviation, which could be analyzed and could be resolved. There is no need to suffer a breakdown.

Models could be made of products. Similarly models could be made of equipment and the entire plant. The whole enterprise could also be modelled — with its business processes, say manufacturing, supply chain, sales etc. Here there are people involved. It makes the model uncertain. Apart from physics, chemistry and engineering, you do require knowledge of human psychology to factor them in the model.

When models are made, they are called digital twins. A digital twin is essentially a computer programme that uses real-world data to create simulations. These simulations predict how a product/process will perform. Thus a twin is a connected virtual replica of an in-service physical asset.

The emergence of sensors on physical products in the last decade and the ability to process the data have made modelling easier.

Digital Twins

Projects have become capital-intensive. That is the reason why digital twins are crucial. There are three types of digital twins — product twins, production twins, and performance twins.

There could be combination and integration of these three. It results into a digital thread. It is a thread since it is woven bringing data from all stages of product life cycle (PLC).

These twins evolve and update continuously. There is a closed-loop of feedback in a virtual environment. It results into product, production and performance optimization at minimal cost.

In developing twins, the first step is conceptualization of the entity in terms of its organisational context and existing knowledge-base. There are interviews and focus-group sessions. As a second step, the twin is validated by tying up the twin to reality. It is tested to see whether it behaves as it does in reality. Validation is at the individual level and relationship level. As the last step, the twin is subjected to simulations — both quantitative and qualitative and do decision-making checks.

The model developed could be wobbly to begin with, but it evolves over a period of time. It can be tweaked and matured.

On a digital twin, one can run hundreds of what-if and if-what analyses for decision-making.

Benefits

Product digital twins validate product performance — how a product performs under different conditions If adjustments are to be made, they are made in the virtual world and in real-world the product performs exactly as expected.

There is no need for multiple prototypes. The development time is reduced. Twins improve the quality of the final product. There are faster iterations to feedback.

Production digital twins validate manufacturing before it is brought on the shop floor. It simulates the process. The production methodology is developed which remains efficient under various conditions.

Costly downtime to equipment could be curtailed. We can predict preventive maintenance.

Manufacturing operations become faster, efficient and reliable.

Performance digital twins use the vast amount of data from products and plants to get actionable insights for decision-making. The performance twins are leveraged to create business opportunities, aggregation and analysis.

Cube Model

There are 252 different classifications, but all of then do not occur in reality. Out of 30 plus digital twins case studies, it has been inferred there are three common digital twins.

AI and ML

These enable the creation of digital twins which are dimensionally accurate 3-D models. which can be upgraded quickly. It can be a 3D or 2D model.

Coinage

The term has been coined by Michael Grieves, University of Michigan in 2002. However, without calling it a digital twin, NASA has used the twin models for around 50 years prior to that. Gartner selected Digital Twins as one Significant Technology Trend for 2017 (in 2016).

Applications

Digital twins are used in manufacturing, automobile manufacturing, healthcare, energy systems, hotels and urban planning (say a City Twin).

Microsoft’s Azure Digital Twins is an IoT platform that enables creation of digital representation of real-world things, places, business processes and people.

At present, an 18% GST is levied on services provided by crypto exchanges. These are categorised as financial services. It is being studied which other crypto activities may fall under GST net. Mining of cryptos and the use of virtual digital assets (VDAs) as a medium of exchange may come under the tax net.

Crypto assets are algorithm-based and are decentralised virtual assets protected by cryptography. There are various activities in the crypto eco-system — mining, exchange, payment processing, barter and different transactions. There are onshore and offshore transactions. There should be clarity on goods and services. Cryptos have to be properly classified.

In the budget for FY 2023, the government has already imposed 1 per cent TDS on all VDA transactions. The transfer of VDAs attract on 30% on gains, with no deductions or set-off losses.

Indian pharma industry is the third largest pharma industry in terms of volume and 14th largest in terms of value. In the 1970s, the domestic pharma market was about Rs.650 crore. It has escalated to Rs.1.67 trillion in 2022. The indigenous industry accounts for 90 per cent of this market. By 2030, the industry is expected to touch from the current $45 billion to $120-$130 billion, and in the long term by 2047 to $400-450 billion. The industry will be observing the centenary in 2047 of Indian independence.

The industry is represented by the Indian Pharmaceutical Alliance (IPA).

India caters to a large generics market in the USA.

Bangalore and Hyderabad have become hubs for pharma startups. There should be more such hubs. The early industry was shaped by entrepreneurs, say scientists and risk-takers. They took advantage of the process patent allowed in the 1970s.

India has to take baby steps in the new drug discovery now. India requires pathbreaking innovations.

The government is launching open network for digital commerce in the Indian market in the later half of 2022. It will be launched from Bangalore, and will roll out in other cities later. ONDC has onboarded a large number of local vendors on the platform. There are 9 other platforms who have onboarded ONDC. Some 17 more platforms are in advanced stages of integration. It has raised a capital of Rs.157 crore from some 17 financial institutions. Microsoft gives ONDC its first Big Tech push by launching a shopping app for Indian consumers.

ONDC is a UPI-like innovation in digital commerce. The app is still in the pilot phase. It expects to have 2 million retailers on digital commerce platforms in the next five years. At present there are 15000 retailers.

We have already written about the Account Aggregators. Essentially, AA is a data sharing protocol between financial institutions conceived as a mechanism to reduce the waiting time for individuals in queues at the bank branches, to avoid using cumbersome banking portals, and sharing their passwords. There is no need to seek out physical notarisation to access and share their financial documents.

This protocol opens up the financial eco-system. It unleashes next wave of financial inclusion and financial innovation.

It has a layer of consumer consent. Users can control the data that is being used by the financial institutions.

So far, 1.1billion bank accounts (both from public and private banks) have gone live in India’s AA eco -system.

However, the new guidelines issued by the RBI eliminates the need for intermediaries. It stipulates direct pass-through of loans from bank to customer, thus eliminating the role of third parties such as payment aggregators. The AAs have sought relief from the RBI.

On an e-commerce site, after selecting the product, the payment is to be made — it should be just a click. It should be easy for the customer to pay. This happens on account of embedded finance. It is the link that connects the customer and organisation. The payment should be made without leaving an app or a site.

Mostly the payments are for a selected product or service. However, there could be payment for an unrelated product, which is available on the same site. Suppose a customer buys a TV and then buys insurance for TV. Here he is dealing with two different organisations, but is clearing on the same platform or application.

In this decade, the embedded finance industry is growing. It is expected to reach $22 billion by 2029.

Embedded insurance has emerged as a distribution innovation for insurers. There is a huge demand for this in travel industry. MakeMyTrip and Amazon have developed contextual insurance products, along with their core products.

Travel companies such as IRCTC and mobility firms such as Old too have embedded financial products.

Oracle works tech layers of embedded finance firms. Their complete stack is available on cloud. The packages cloud app, cloud infrastructure and Oracle database are seamlessly integrated. It is necessary to go near the customer rather than expecting the customer to come to the financial institution. Embedded finance must enhance the customer’s user experience. Companies integrate the bank’s ERP system with the customers.

Embedded finance makes a non-banking consumer company more efficient. In fact, a non-banking company turns a fintech because of embedded finance. The digital era essentially calls for embedded finance.

The banks and financial institutions are exposed to an altogether new set of clients. Embedded finance enhances the capabilities of a general merchandise company by incorporating finance into its platform. In addition, the customer base is widened.