Mumbai: Reliance Industries is pursuing another market-disrupting venture-offering genomic tests below ₹1,000, a nearly tenfold drop from the prevailing basic rates of around ₹10,000.
The energy-to-retail conglomerate is leveraging Strand Life Sciences for its entry into the emerging areas of specialised healthcare diagnostics and genomic sciences. Reliance had acquired the Bengaluru-based company for ₹393 crore in 2021.
Genomic tests are based on blood or saliva samples or tissues extracted from the body. Such tests are gaining traction, helping understand the risks of diseases, how cancers progress, guide personalised plans for targeted therapies, and in distinguishing inherited traits like genes, proteins, or chromosomes that affect individual well-being.
“We would like to make an impact,” Nilesh Modi, director, Strand Life Sciences and a veteran RIL official told ET. “This is kind of a Jio-fication in genomics so that the tests can be accessed across all income groups. However, we have not fixed timelines. Our chairman (Mukesh Ambani) has given us the task.”
Reliance’s entry into the genomic tests market could trigger a disruption similar to that of its telecom venture Jio in 2016. At the time, the company revolutionised mobile phone penetration in India with a dramatic decline in call rates and internet data services.
“Our mid-term goal is to bring the price of CancerSpot cancer early detection screening test to ₹9,999 and aspire to reduce it further to triple digits in the coming decade,” Strand Life Sciences said in a statement separately. “We want to make genetic sequencing and early cancer screening accessible and affordable to the masses.”
Towards this aim, Reliance would strive to reduce “gene sequencing costs with scientific innovations in the assay design and engineering innovations in lab techniques, and with the benefits of scale.”
The first hints of a decisive push towards this project came earlier this year. In his annual general meeting speech, Ambani spoke about the breakthroughs in genomics and the promising future it holds for “dramatic improvements in cure of diseases, longevity, and overall health.”
“We are expanding into the frontiers of digital health, life sciences and genomics. And we are developing AI as a new growth engine,” he said.
CancerSpot
CancerSpot is an AI-based genome sequencing and analysis model that aids in early detection of ten types of cancers including liver, gallbladder, pancreatic, breast, and stomach. However, it is a screening test and not recognised as a confirmatory test. According to company experts, typically, the annual incidence of cancer in those above 50 is less than one per 100 individuals, while among those identified as CancerSpot positive, this rate goes up 10-30 times.
Those who are positive must follow up with standard-of-care diagnostic steps to confirm the presence of cancer.>
Published On Dec 17, 2025 at 07:45 AM IST
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