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Bio-based economy to drive growth in future

Nandita Vijay, Bengaluru Thursday, June 14, 2012, 08:00 Hrs  [IST]

Bio-based economy is the key growth driver of the future. Information technology and biotechnology are intertwined to play a role in the emerging bio economy, said Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw, chairperson vision group on biotechnology and CMD Biocon Ltd.

The national and international biotechnology industry is now at the beginning of a technology curve whose upside potential appears limitless. The Indian government is considering biotechnology as the next driver of innovation and economic growth. Biotechnology has made phenomenal success in India in almost all the sectors primarily in healthcare according to Rajashree Sharma,  Partner,  Corporate Law Group, New Delhi.

Innovation and manufacturing tailored to affordability are the key drivers of bio-based economy, said Dr. P M Murali president, Association of Biotechnology Led Entrepreneurs (ABLE) and MD & CEO Evolva.

According to Dr. Satya Dash, former Chief Operating Officer, ABLE, "The biotechnology sector in India will significantly contribute to the nation's GDP  in the future and offer innovative solutions to challenges that are both national and global ".

At this edition of ACHEMA which is the global  forum of the process industry which includes  biotechnology the focus will be on promising partnerships to unlock the inherent strengths of ACHEMA said Shaw.

Biotechnology sector is all about partnerships. Pacts with academia and industry; companies and countries have already driven the much needed growth of the sector. We now need to expand the bandwidth of prospects, said Dr. Vijay Chandru, past president, ABLE and founder and CMD, Strand Life sciences.

Indian biotech industry is valued at Rs. 20,000 crore with a growth rate of 20 per cent annually. There are around 300 biotech industries in India. Experts view the future of the sector as  manufacturing, research on biosimilars, development of bio-fuels and  bio-services. In order to become a serious players we need to concentrate on all these segments and a lot more needs  to be done, said Shaw.

Government needs to look at additional funding to support the industry. There is need to make sure that both academia and industry play an important role for the growth of the sector. “Innovation is the key and bio cluster will create the required environ for development of the sector,”  Shaw added.

Biotech industry  needs to  create an experimental culture, foster an entrepreneurial environment, and incentivize business differentiation. The recession of 2008 has created a siege mentality across businesses. Innovation-led companies have become bankrupt. R&D is going through an economic wringer. Corporates have crimped  R&D spend  and the West has seen large-scale retrenchment of scientists . In fact, biotechnology companies could scare up much  lesser in  the last decade. In this  scenario India  is looked upon as a beacon of hope to  bail out the West from this crisis and  a  global enabler of  affordable drug development, said Shaw.

Innovation is becoming increasingly unaffordable in the West. New drug  development is becoming more  expensive. As a result, generic drug manufacturing has shifted from the West to India and China. The West is also not able to get sufficient  patients to carry out clinical trials. In a way it is  good because  it shows  the general health of the public  is improving. However , that is only in the West. In developing and underdeveloped nations, there is no dearth of patients, which is a pointer to the scope of conducting clinic trials in these regions said  Shaw.

Biotechnology draws on the pure biological sciences (genetics, microbiology, animal cell culture, molecular biology, biochemistry, embryology, cell biology) and in many instances is also dependent on knowledge and methods from outside the sphere of biology (chemical engineering, bioprocess engineering, information technology, bio robotics). Conversely, modern biological sciences (including even concepts such as molecular ecology) are intimately entwined and dependent on the methods developed through biotechnology and what is commonly thought of as the life sciences industry.

Biotechnology has applications in four major industrial areas, including health care (medical), crop production and agriculture, non-food (industrial) uses of crops and other products (e.g. biodegradable plastics, vegetable oil, biofuels), and environmental uses.

Bioinformatics is an interdisciplinary field which addresses biological problems using computational techniques, and makes the rapid organization and analysis of biological data possible. It  plays a key role in functional genomics, structural genomics ,proteomics and forms a key component in the biotechnology and pharmaceutical sector.

There are concepts like the blue biotechnology and green biotechnology. While the former is new and refers to   marine and aquatic applications of biotechnology, the latter is applied to agricultural processes,  designing of transgenic plants to grow under specific environments which are   more environmentally friendly.

India has the capability for  producing high-value biotech products targeting diseases areas like diabetes and oncology.  Biotechnology is viewed as the sector for next revolution in India like the information technology and telecom.

The bio-pharma segment accounts for 70 per cent of the total biotech business accounting for Rs. 2,365 crore which is followed by bio-services, that generates Rs. Rs. 721 crore, bio agri valued at Rs. 551 crore, bio industrial services estimated at Rs. 140 crore and bioinformatics which is Rs. 58 core.

 The leading companies in the country in the biopharma are Bengaluru’s Biocon, Pune - based Serum Institute, New Delhi’s Panacea Biotech, besides two of Hyderabad-based manufacturers:  Shanta Biotech, the  Indian vaccine arm for Sanofi Pasteur which introduced the country’s first genetically engineered the recombinant Hepatitis B vaccine ‘ Shanvac-B,’ and Bharat Biotech.   

Biosimilar and therapeutic sector has registered an earnings of Rs. 1780 crore with a growth rate of 35 per cent. India has proved its capabilities to  develop drugs from small molecules to biologics at an affordable cost and posses huge opportunities in this sector. The country also has 20 recombinant  therapeutics where companies like  Biocon, Panacea biotech and Intas have proved their mettle.

The country  is expected to become the hub of  biotechnology following the trends of IT industry. Biotechnology is playing a valuable role  in  serving the world’s rising population.  Biotech had already provided good and healthy food, water, air and pharmaceuticals to the growing population and solutions to the deteriorating ecology. It has also been a boon in the areas like  drug development and discovery and bio-medicals, said Prof. G Padmanabhan, scientist emeritus and former director, Indian Institute of Science.

Biosimilars are biopharmaceuticals that are becoming important since they are similar versions of the important patented innovator drugs like herceptin and enbrel, patents of which are due to expire shortly. Global sales of biosimilars is expected to reach $1.9 to 2.6 billion by 2015.

“Biomanufacturing is a capital- intensive activity where infrastructure costs are high. Biosimilars is an opportunity that India cannot afford to miss. Many countries like Korea, Malaysia, Singapore, Turkey, Taiwan, Turkey and Argentina are finalising their guidelines for biosimilars. South Korea is actively expanding its world-class clinical trials and production infrastructure, cultivating bio-specialized manpower, building R&D, legal and system support strategies. India too should come out with its biosimilar policy and encourage bio-manufacturing in a big way ” said Shaw.

Although the country has the expertise and the capability to focus on the sustenance of a bio-economy  there is need for simplified procedures for obtaining various approvals, including biotech medicines like insulin, monoclonal antibodies(MAbs)  and recombinant proteins in the list of essential drugs.

As ACHEMA focuses on creation of a ‘Bio-basedWorld’ which covers diverse concepts for the use of renewable resources like  biomass processing, development of bio-based products and biotech drugs, India is now gearing up to accelerate the  bio-based economy. The expertise and talent in  chemistry and biotechnology are gradually merging and the roadmap for the future is  of a bio-economy.

 
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