Google’s co-founder Larry Page has an ‘eye’ on Madurai

BANGALORE: For the geeks of the world, this could be an eye-opener.

Larry Page, co-founder of Google, made a quiet visit to the temple town of Madurai to see an eye care institution, which management guru C K Prahalad called the “gem at the bottom of the pyramid”.

The global geek was impressed on Sunday with the assembly line approach of Aravind Eye Hospital that conducts over 2.75 lakh eye surgeries every year.

Each of Aravind’s doctors’ conduct an average of 2,200 surgeries annually compared with average of 250 by doctors of other hospitals in India.

The hospital group sees 1.8 million patients every year with 65% of them undergoing cataract treatment. The cataract surgeries cost less than Rs 700, the lowest in the world, for patients who come from as far as Assam.

“Page had learnt about our work from Prahalad’s writings. He has offered us help with technology to improve our processes,” Aravind Eye Hospital executive director R D Thulasiraj told DNA Money.

Larry Brilliant, executive director of google.org, the philanthropy agency of the search engine, brought the 33-year old Page to Aravind.

Brilliant, who played a role in eliminating small pox in India in the early 1970s, has been a patron of Aravind through a non-governmental organisation called Seva.

He was also a close friend of G Venkataswamy, the founder of Aravind, who died recently.

The business model of Aravind, which provides eye care to 80% of its patients at very low costs and yet remains financially  independent is a case study that is taught in many business schools in India and the West.

“You could use our resources to improve the way you serve the needy population,” Page was quoted as saying.

Google engineers will revamp the portal of Aravind; provide technology of Google Earth, its mapping software to enable the eye care institution to map areas of blind population.

Google officials in India said that both Page and Brilliant, who came in their private jet, had left the country and did not elaborate further. Both founders of Google, Larry Page and Sergey Brin have visited India on previous occasions to meet their employees.

The financial benefit for Aravind through the visit of the Google co-founder would be through placing free ads of the hospital group, which also has produces lenses and eye care equipment and sold in many countries.