Anuradha Acharya, CEO and CSA, Ocimum Biosolutions, has worked in several roles from an IT professional to a technical leader with eight years of experience in full development life-cycle projects.
Ocimum is a life sciences company with focus on bioinformatics and contract research services with operations both in the USA and India. Acharya's current technical interests lie in bioinformatics algorithms and lab automation. She has worked for Mantiss Information, Chicago, which is now part of Dynegy and SEI Information Systems before establishing Ocimum Biosolutions with Subash Lingareddy in 2000 in Indianapolis.
In conversation with Y V Phani Raj of Pharmabiz.com, Anuradha Acharya explains her observations about the industry, contributions of the company, alliances established and future plans. Excerpts:
What was the scenario, when Ocimum Biosolutions was founded. Did you have competitors in India at that time?
Ocimum Biosolutions is a life sciences contract research and development company with competencies in Bioinformatics, LIMS, Genomics, Proteomics and custom contract research services, with operations in USA and India. Ocimum Biosolutions is funded by Ficus Enterprises, the world's largest producer of Sulpha-Methaoxazole, and one of the top three producers of Ranitidine in India. The company's primary focus is to be one-stop destination for bioinformatics consulting need and also on development of key ready-to-use Bioinformatics software modules, contract research and raining.
Our team comprises experts from Life Sciences / Computer Sciences backgrounds. It started its operations in India at the end of the year 2000. At that time no company in India was working on Bio-informatics. But, in the year 2001 many big corporates such as Satyam, TCS and GVK Biosciences stepped into the industry. Ocimum was first interested in setting up a contract-sequencing lab, but as the patent laws changed, our plans on contract sequencing were stopped.
What are the products that Ocimum offers to industry? What are your key products?
Ocimum provides key, ready to use, reliable, cost-effective software solutions for the biotech / pharma industry- with a suite of products such as Gencheck, Biotracker, Optgene, Nutrabase, Proteowiz and Genowiz. Our key products are Biotracker and Optgene. They are very unique.
Biotracker is a GLP and US FDA 21 CFR Part 11 compliant Laboratory Information and knowledge Management System. It is an effective tool for improving laboratory performance. It allows analysts to keep track of samples, reagents, instruments, processes, and results at every stage of a project. It has an extensive report-generating engine with built in utilities for efficient 'Project Management'.
OptGene is a novel Gene Optimizing tool that optimizes naturally occurring genes to achieve higher productivity, at the same time giving higher flexibility for protein design. The tool optimizes the genes using only the sequence information and the choice of expression system. It allows the researchers to adapt genes and their products precisely to their specific requirements.
How do you rate the growth of Indian pharma, biotech and bioinformatics industry, as of today and in the years ahead?
The Indian pharmaceuticals industry is in a commanding position today. It is very strong in bulk drugs. The biotech industry in the country needs to improve. And it will take few more years for bioinformatics industry to develop, the industry is slowly progressing, currently.
By 2005, the way the pharma companies manage their operations is going to change tremendously. As a number of successful companies in the industry will grow, the industry will also show upward trend in growth. In the bioinformatics industry, big IT companies will be the key service providers. Companies in the industry including TCS, Ocimum and other players will all be able to make a difference in the products and services that they offer.
We are known today as vaccine manufacturers. In the coming years we should focus more on Drug Discovery and Research. New drugs should be brought into the market.
Tell us the kind of consultants that you have in your organization?
A high premium is placed on the quality of our human resources. International standards are maintained during the recruitment process, subsequent to which our consultants, all with advanced degrees in life sciences and computer sciences are cross-trained under the supervision of experts. A collaboration with the Michigan Technological University for Bioinformatics training ensures that our consultants are Proficient in Genomics, DNA Sequencing and Analysis, Proteomics and Functional
Bioinformatics.
Our consultants ideally complement a biotech company's operations, and execute contracts both onsite and off. They are available on a contract, a contract-to-hire or a direct hire basis.
What are the contract research services that you offer?
We offer pre-clinical contract research and discovery services that span the entire spectrum of pre-clinical studies, in a world class GLP grade lab. Our team of experienced scientists will complement client's existing skills and help the client in testing leads at a very reasonable cost, while maintaining world-class quality. Our services encompass bio- availability, bio-distribution and bio-equivalence studies for new experimental drugs. Drug efficacy testing and toxicology studies can be performed in various animal models within existing protocols.
The services include- Drug Screening & Efficacy Studies, Bioassay Development, Cell based and in-vivo testing, Pharmacokinetic studies, Toxicology Studies, ADMET Studies, IND Planning and Submission.
Please tell us about your contract manufacturing services?
Ocimum's primary focus is on producing zero-defect specialty biological and non-biological products for diagnostic, biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies on a worldwide basis. All products are manufactured under confidential end-user / OEM contracts, in strict accordance with environmental and local laws. Further, all products will conform to US FDA manufacturing standards.
The company provides process and product scale-up for pre-clinical through Phase III clinical trial material. Each manufacturing proposal and contract is tailored to meet the specific conditions of individual clients, particularly regarding space and time allocation. The services include Scale-Up Projects, Formulations, Pilot Batch Production and Full Scale Production.
What are the other services that Ocimum offers?
Custom services such as Biological database creation and manipulation, Data mining, Algorithm development, Gene identification and function prediction, Whole Genome Annotation, Multiple platform software development, Software module testing and comparison, Object oriented design and GUI design, Parallel and distributed computing and Visualization tool development for any aspect of the laboratory process.
Ocimum has obtained an ISO 9001:2000 Certificate for Quality Management System from Det Norske Veritas during mid 2003. How significant is it to the company?
We had been certified to ISO 9001: 2000 under the RvA accreditation. The ISO 9001:2000 standard is an internationally recognized quality management system standard developed by the International Organization of Standardization. To be certified to this standard, Ocimum implemented a quality management system covering the analysis, design, coding, testing, installation and after sales support of software related to Laboratory Information Management System and Bio-Informatics. The process approach enshrined in 9001:2000 focuses on business management aspects of an organization while retaining emphasis on traditional software development life-cycle processes.
The ISO 9001:2000 certification serves as an impartial and public appraisal of the Ocimum Software procedures and products, and provides us with guidelines to continue producing the highest-quality Bioinformatics and LIMS software.
Who are your partners? And who are your clients?
We have partnership with Sun Microsystems, Icynosure, United Bioinformatic Inc. (UBI)- Canada, BioEnterprise Asia, Extenprise, Labtronics Inc., University of Alabama in Huntsville, Simax- Germany, Comptel Solutions- Singapore, Viricent-Malaysia etc.
Our clients include Dow AgroSciences, Zydus Research Centre, IIT Kharagpur, Hospital for Joint Diseases, NYU etc., The group's clientele include global majors such as Glaxo Burroughs Wellcome / Smithkline Beecham, Apotex, Roche, Teva Pharma, Sanofi Winthrop, and Shionogi & Co. Ltd., among others.
What are your company's future plans?
We hope to set up a Wet Lab soon, for which we will be requiring an expert in this field. We would also lay emphasis on drug discovery, try to bring out new bioinformatics products. Maintain competency and provide better solutions to clients. To meet the needs of our expansion, we may increase our strength in our Indian operations by additional 15 to 20 members. We would ensure that we provide products or services, what the client is looking for.