Healtheon co-founder, executive vice-president and chief technology officer Pavan Nigam told The Financial Express that the company was exploring the possibility of tying up with Indian healthcare majors such as Apollo Hospitals and pharmaceutical corporates for providing its web-based services.Further expansion in Indian operations will be made largely to cater to Indian hospitals, doctors and other healthcare institutions and companies. Healtheon, which opened a $2-million subsidiary in Hyderabad in April this year, at present has 25 software engineers who undertake development work for the parent company only.

The development centre is the only one outside of the Silicon Valley though the company has presence in Canada and Europe also. Healtheon has 1,500 employees worldwide and is planning to double the number this year.Havingrecently bought 50 per cent of the stock of WebMD, another San Jose-based healthcare internet marketing company, Healtheon could consider bringing WebMD into India as Healtheon's marketing arm, Nigam said.After the takeover, the total market capitalisation of Healtheon is estimated to be close to $20 billion from $10 billion earlier, making it one of the most successful companies providing mission critical transaction services on the internet.

The company, identified as one of the 25 most promising companies by the Fortune magazine in 1996, went public in February this year and had the third biggest first-day gain in the stock price ever in the history of the US stock market.

In fact, its initial public offering (IPO) has been variously ranked as the best in the last one year in the country. Since its takeover deal for WebMD was inked, Healtheon's stock has risen from $60 to over $110.

The company was started in 1996 by Jim Clark, who is chairman of the board, and Pavan Nigam.

Healtheon has developeda highly secure and scalable internet-based platform that supports high volume mission critical transactions and integrates widely distributed applications and data, using a modular, tiered, CORBA-based architecture. By connecting payers, providers, employers and suppliers, information is easily obtained and synchronised across several delivery systems and communities across the world. One third of the medical fraternity in the US today uses Healtheon services.

"By using our vast array of data bank and interactive services, Healtheon is in a position to make a large difference to the archtypical Indian medical fraternity and simplify the availability of information," said Nigam.