GVK BIO, leading
contract research & development (R&D) organization aims to move its drug discovery programmes to development and maximise returns in the next three years, according to CEO Manni Kantipudi.
Established in 2001 and headquartered in Hyderabad, the company wants to retain its leadership position in discovery, focus on ramping up development and continue to work with small and medium sized pharma and biotech companies in the US and integrate their US operations with India, he said.
Growth potential
The company wants to tap the growing business potential offered in the biologics and formulations business. For biologics, it wants to leverage Aragen Bioscience, Inc., 100 per cent subsidiary of GVK BIO; to accelerate large molecule drug discovery. The company is keen to integrate Aragen’s services with Indian operations and leverage inherent strengths. Biologics discovery accounts for about 10-12 per cent of the overall business activity.
The company is also keen to grow its new business - formulation and analytical services segment and leverage formulations strength that India offers vis-a-vis China.
The company has always been open to mergers and acquisitions as a growth strategy. It has been operating two 100 per cent subsidiaries, Aragen Bioscience Inc. (based in San Francisco) and Inogent Laboratories. GVK Biosciences and Inogent Laboratories will be merged shortly having received approval from the Board and currently going through a legal process. The court orders are expected around March 2018.
Investment plans
GVK Biosciences plans to invest Rs. 200-250 crore in the next two years including the upcoming production facility in Vizag. The company, which has recently set up an analytical facility, plans to add new buildings in Hyderabad and Bengaluru campus with this investments.
The company is operating six production blocks in Hyderabad with global regulatory approvals (including USFDA) and plans to commission its new unit at Pharma SEZ in Visakhapatnam with two production blocks, by January 2018. The unit will carry out process R&D and manufacturing.
The company recently changed its Core Values to align with the changing business landscape. These values are now called ETHICS (Empowerment, Teamwork , Honesty & Integrity, Innovation,| Customer Focus, Safety & Compliance) and are a reflection of importance that innovation and R&D has for firms like GVK BIO that work in the research & development space. The 2000-strong scientist pool including 200 PhDs are constantly pushing the frontiers of innovation and R&D to bring customers’ products faster to market backed with strong problem-solving capabilities & timely delivery. GVK BIO is able to harness its scientific pool to address R&D challenges in drug discovery and development programs for its 400 global customers.
The company has developed strong collaborative research projects with many small & medium pharma and biotech companies, research and academic institutions over last 16 years. Spread across drug discovery and development programs – the company has been running multiple research collaborations. It recently celebrated 10 years research collaboration with Nuevolution, a leading small molecule drug discovery biotech company based at Copenhagen, Denmark.
CEO of the company
Manni Kantipudi, joined GVK BIO in 2007 as President and was elevated as CEO and now spent 10 years in the leadership position. He pursued a bachelor’s degree in computer engineering at the University of Mumbai and a master’s degree in computer science at Arizona State University. In his 16 years at Intel, Manni handled senior management roles in manufacturing, sales and marketing, and product development, amongst others. He also set up the India Intel R&D centre and scaled the facility up to around 1000 employees in three years’ time. The long stint at Intel helped him learn about building scale, importance of systems and processes, change management, learning on the job, and building teams – all guiding principles that drive his current work as CEO.
Infrastructure
Its modern facilities are spread across 55 acres of land & confirm to stringent regulatory standards. The infrastructure has a built-up area of more than 1,200,000 square feet, housing chemistry & biology labs, AAALAC accredited animal house, analytical labs, formulation development labs, kilo labs, pilot plants and manufacturing facilities. GVK BIO has been inspected by all the leading regulatory agencies of the world including USFDA, WHO, PMDA, EDQM and EMEA and audited by most of the global leading pharma companies.