Altimetrik opens healthcare AI centre in Hyderabad, tapping city's pharma talent

AI engineering company Altimetrik has opened a Healthcare and Life Sciences centre of excellence (CoE) in Hyderabad, the company said in a release announcing the facility.

The centre will support work across drug discovery, clinical development, commercial operations, manufacturing, patient engagement and care delivery.

According to the company, the facility brings together AI engineers and life sciences specialists to build agents that meet regulatory requirements, trace every output to trusted sources, and keep people accountable for decisions. That emphasis on traceability and human accountability reflects the scrutiny applied to artificial intelligence tools used in regulated fields such as pharmaceuticals and healthcare, where errors can have direct consequences for patients and where companies must be able to show regulators how a conclusion was reached.

The CoE is part of Altimetrik's 22,000 sq ft office in Gachibowli, which houses more than 300 of the company's employees. The company said the new centre gives it a dedicated industry-focused facility in India and expands the role of its Indian teams in global AI engineering delivery.

Altimetrik's recent expansion in Pune took its global workforce past 11,000 employees.

Chief Executive Officer Raj Sundaresan said Hyderabad was chosen because of its deep pharmaceutical expertise and technology talent, as well as the presence of pharmaceutical companies and contract research organisations in the city.

Hyderabad has built a substantial life sciences cluster over the past two decades, spanning bulk drug manufacturing, formulations and contract research services, alongside a large information technology and engineering workforce. Several global companies run capability centres in the city that combine software development with domain-specific work in health, finance and manufacturing.

The announcement did not disclose the investment committed to the new centre, the number of people it will employ, or a timeline for hiring. It also did not specify which clients or therapeutic areas the facility will serve first.

The opening adds to a growing trend of AI services firms creating specialised units for particular industries rather than offering general-purpose engineering. For life sciences clients, such units typically work on data pipelines, regulatory documentation, clinical trial operations and commercial analytics, areas where automation promises efficiency but must operate within validation and compliance frameworks.

Altimetrik has not stated how the Hyderabad centre will be governed or audited, or which regulatory standards its AI agents are being designed to meet. The release referred only to meeting regulatory requirements in general terms.

The centre's stated focus on keeping people accountable for decisions is notable given continuing debate over how much autonomy should be granted to AI systems in clinical and commercial settings. Industry practice generally requires that qualified professionals retain sign-off authority over outputs that affect patients, regulatory filings or medical claims.

Altimetrik did not respond in the release to questions on these points. The company's expansion in India follows a broader pattern of multinational firms and Indian engineering services companies adding domain specialists to teams that were previously staffed mainly by software engineers.