"Ranbaxyfordoctors.com will address the information needs of a wide variety of specialist doctors and at the same time provide a virtual interface for the doctors to get in touch with Ranbaxy 24 hours on all weekdays", Ranbaxy president Brian Tempest told The Financial Express.

The portal will also offer latest news from the world of medicine. The news content has been licensed from Reuters, world's largest news gathering agency and will cover details like clinical, drug development, epidemiology, ethical, public health, professional development, regulatory etc. Although the site is currently India-specific, but it will invite overseas medical specialists to come online for discussions from January 2001.

The site aims to cater to the news and information requirements of 16 different specialised segments ranging from cardiology to infectious diseases on a daily basis. "The portal will facilitate D2D interaction through a virtual platform where Ranbaxy arranges a conference through the net", Dr Tempest said. Ranbaxyfordoctors.com is a forward looking innovative marketing tool which is academic oriented and need specific portal which the doctors can utilise to the fullest of their advantage, he said.

The site is not a business-to-business site, instead it is a doctor-to-doctor portal and has attracted 10,000 hits a week, which is very good by any standards, Dr Tempest said. Dr Tempest declined to comment on the amount spent on the portal, but said that it is an incremental project and will involve focused investment at every stage.

Ranbaxy has always been in the forefront in terms of disseminating scientific information to doctors. Such chat sessions are a novel way for doctors to share their knowledge and update themselves on topical issues irrespective of geographics, Dr Tempest said.

The portal aims to build a community of doctors linking and connecting them for sharing scientific information through the Internet.

Certain doctors and specialists is the target group for Ranbaxyfordoctors.com which invites doctors for specific discussions and interactions and will help them remove their doubts and answer their queries, Dr Tempest added.