The proliferation of private hospital chains around the world has given rise to concerns about spiralling healthcare costs and deepening health inequities. These concerns are particularly pertinent in India, where the rapid growth of corporate hospitals (for-profit hospital groups offering specialised services) since the 1980s has coincided with low investment in public healthcare services and where health expenditures are predominantly covered out of pocket. The thesis explores how the promise of high-end medicine and the requirement of making a profit play out in the everyday practices of Indian corporate hospital care. Based on twelve months of ethnographic research in a leading corporate hospital in South India, the dissertation details the therapeutic, financial and ethical considerations that shape the treatment of patients with highly unequal resources at their disposal. The research shows how doctors and administrators do not apply uniform rules but vary standards depending on patients’ circumstances and the shifting requirements of their institution. To capture these practices, the thesis introduces the concept of “standardised variability” and delineates the crucial role played by charismatic doctors in institutionalising this variability. The findings demonstrate that corporatisation does not necessarily lead to the standardisation and rationalisation of healthcare delivery and that variability is not restricted to marginal healthcare settings. Instead, variability also emerges in centres of biomedical practice where advanced medical tools are applied to a highly diverse pool of patients, resulting in profitable but selective and unpredictable forms of care.