According to Gabrielle Seacy of AktivOrtho, there are so many smart, talented people in India and the government needs to do much more to support them. AktivOrtho is a New Delhi-based orthopedic rehabilitation, sports medicine and medical fitness center

Gabrielle Seacy and her husband co-founded AktivOrtho to bring Western standards of Comprehensive Orthopedic Rehabilitation to India. Ms Seacy, who studied in Ireland, had worked for 15 years in marketing and business management. She moved from Germany to Delhi with her husband Dr Gerd Mueller and their two young children in February 2012. In April 2012, they started AktivOrtho with a team of eight physiotherapists, which has now grown to 28 physiotherapists and sports therapists. Till now, Aktivortho has treated over 2,500 patients. The turnover of the company is Rs8 crore with a gross profit margin of 55%.
 

Read the excerpts of the interview with Hitisha Jain of Moneylife:
 

Hitisha Jain (ML): What gave birth to AktivOrtho? Why did you choose Delhi as your base?
 

Gabrielle Seacy (GS): I and my husband Dr Mueller, who is also the founder of AktivOrtho, decided to bring Western standards of Comprehensive Orthopedic Rehabilitation to India.
 

Delhi chose us it seems, as did India in fact. We had patients from Delhi coming to our centres in Germany asking “why don’t you do this in India – we have nothing like this here”. That’s where it started almost five years ago. For two years, we travelled to and from India to see how best to make this model work, meeting with potential partners etc. In fact, our chief executive Dr Rajen Ghadiok (MD), who joined us two months ago, was one of the first people we met back then.
 

ML: What inspired you to start an orthopedic rehabilitation centre? How is it different from other orthopedic clinics?
 

GS: What makes our philosophy different is that we take a very active approach (thus our name!) in our treatment process; we engage our patients from day one with counseling and support to teach them to be more active in their daily life. It is a process and there is no quick-fix. We take a long term approach – yes, they may come with a chronic problem and we first need to solve their immediate pain but also we need to undo what is most likely years of a sedentary life-style and gradually get them to build exercise into their daily routine. Daily exercise is as much a requirement of our daily life as good nutrition and drinking water. Having seen the immense need in India and realising how nascent rehabilitation medicine is here, we strongly felt we could make a difference. So, we came up with the concept of setting up AktivOrtho.
 

ML: What challenges you faced while shifting to India?
 

GS: Every country and a new start-up have its challenges, but we have been blessed with finding a great team of employees. It takes time to find them and train them but overall we have been happy with the standard of staff generally. Prior to starting this project in India, Dr Mueller was Chairman (and also Founder back in 2000) of the Rueckenzentrum Group in Germany, which has seven centers across Hamburg, Berlin, Bremen and Cologne. For family reasons and also just for the challenge, we decided to do this project. We both like India very much, the people, the culture and we felt our children too would be happy here. Thankfully it has worked out really well – we have a great network of followers and friends, who keep us motivated and inspired!

ML: Why according to you it is important to encourage women entrepreneurship in India?
 

GS: Entrepreneurship is really a state of mind and an attitude of “yes I can do this”. Belief in oneself along with a strong passion for what you do and wanting to really do it the best you can are the key pre-requisites to successful entrepreneurship. It is hard work and there are moments which are frustrating but nothing in life comes easy. Stay focused on your achieving your goal, work hard, and believe in yourself.
 

India is a vast country with a huge population and there needs to be much more entrepreneurship across all sectors. There are so many smart, talented people here – the government needs to do much more to support entrepreneurs through education, start-up funding, helping to expand/ export. There is quite a brain drain of smart young people, who seek to build their careers overseas but it’s these very people India needs to hold on to – they are the future of India, be they men or women.
 

Specifically on encouraging women to be entrepreneurs, that is of course a given, but much needs to be done to change the social mores, which tend to in fact, hold women back, especially in rural areas. It will happen, but it needs some education and example-setting.
 

ML: What was your initial start-up capital for starting this business? Did you get any support from Government or any other organisation?

GS: The initial capital has been brought in by us privately and we are still in the process of setting up the business and its allied processes. It was started with about three million Euros. We had some initial guidance from a German overseas business development organisation but apart from that, not very much.

ML: Is it challenging for you to be a woman entrepreneur?
 

GS: I think whether you are male or female we all have to prove ourselves and our competencies. It is of course challenging in one’s personal life when as a woman, I am trying to be a great mother as well as managing and growing the business. I have to confess it’s hard; there is a certain amount of guilt I carry about this…not being able to spend as much time with the children but when we are together it’s very intense and is real quality, family time.
 

I remember the excitement and enthusiasm Gerd and I shared over the years we were travelling frequently between Germany and India. That same excitement is there – it’s a feeling of achieving something good here; building a strong team with knowledge that can help a great many people to get better. What is life without good health? The very positive feedback from both staff and patients, who recognise and appreciate the difference we make, is the key driver. The challenge now is to expand and ensure access for all the Western standards of rehabilitation medicine. This will take time and requires a lot of education and quality management to maintain these standards but the results really do speak for themselves.
 

ML: You are from Information Technology (IT) background, did it help in anyway?
 

GS: Having come from the IT sector mainly, over the years I worked with many female and male leaders who inspired me – success does inspire success. Developing best practice habits learnt from those I’ve previously worked with and today, being open to learn from our staff and our clients around, gives me a lot of food for thought as to how I can develop and improve my skills and knowledge. 
 

ML: You are handling the management aspect of the business, how are you dealing with day to day working operations?
 

GS: I could not live without my iPhone – it makes communication instant and helps me act quickly when I need to. I’m a massive believer in MS Excel – it gives me the overview I need for whatever function or activity and helps me to plan and organise myself better. My most commonly used phrase would be – “let’s structure this; let’s make an excel sheet for this project”. An abundance of patience is also important as well as a cool head and never taking things at face value…very important to assess things in detail.
 

ML: How do you see the future of your company?
 

GS: Our future plans would be to take this structured, comprehensive approach to rehabilitation medicine to other parts of the country by setting up more such rehabilitation medicine centers in the next couple of years. We need to conquer India first and then perhaps look at the Middle East and other parts of Asia who badly need our concept. So, the plan is to expand.
 

ML: What is your mantra for our women readers?
 

GS: Stay focused on your goal, believe in yourself and in what you are trying to achieve. Above all stay true to yourself, work with integrity and commitment. The rest will fall into place. Life is short; this is not a dress rehearsal – go for it!
 

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