FDASmart Inc. held its one day conference last week June 9 at the ITC Grand Central Hotel-Parel. This one day event focused on the recent trends in global mergers and acquisition of Indian pharmaceutical and biotech companies especially with cross-border deals.
A group of world class speakers were assembled for the event and featured Deloitte India as Knowledge Partner with Ranjit Shahani-MD Novartis India as keynote speaker. ALL speakers from various stakeholder positions presented on the same theme but with their unique prospective, a trade mark strategy for most FDASmart events in India.
Ranjit Shahani, MD-Novartis-India started with a keynote address featuring the pharmaceutical industry as seen from the CEO eyes of an India based multinational pharmaceutical company . Other speakers included Sumit Ghoshal-Deputy Editor (Business India) who discussed why the recent FDI curb on Pharma M&As need not be feared. He was followed by other speakers such as Dr Milind Antani (Head-Pharmaceutical and Life Sciences-Nishith Desai Associates) who covered legal and IP aspects on pharma M&As with another associate Simon Reis.
Chris Barnett-a London-UK based QP (Qualified Person) who worked in India in the past painted a positive picture of how Indian pharma have changed for the better but quality challenges remain as hurdles to be tackled if Indian pharma are indeed to globalize. Anjan Sen (Deloitte Director of Strategy & Operations) covered an introspective to highlight various aspects of pharma M&As such as where this will all lead to, impact on growth, consolidation, increased competitive viability & prudent leverage of complementarities of core competencies (R&D, manufacturing, marketing, etc.) and financial stability leading towards market leadership.
Dr Kiran Marthak-Member of Board of Directors, Veeda Clinical Research, a leading Indian CRO discussed high profile M&As with CRO companies themselves and summarized net results to the CRO industry as these M&As progress in time.
Vishal Gandhi, vice president & head , Life Sciences Banking - YES BANK, gave an insight into the investor’s point of view and covered the various kinds of financing options available for upcoming and medium-sized Life Science companies in India at present, the associated pros and cons from a company’s perspective and the near-term outlook for these opportunities. Asst Professor Pulak Mishra presented a research study he completed at IIT Kharagpur on an assessment of financial gains from pharmaceutical M&As.
A lively panel discussion with audience participation followed which was hosted by Anjan Sen from Deloitte. An eclectic group of 60 comprising MNCs, 1st and 2nd tier Indian pharma, legal and advisory life sciences firms, private equity investors, pharma media, etc attended the conference . Speaker presentations, photos, etc will be posted on-line for a limited time at this website link: www.fdasmart.com/events/ma/globalindianma.html