The biggest challenge in biotechnology is that of investing in R&D. There is an imminent need to encourage young scientist entrepreneurs who are actually conceptualising new business ventures and trying to monetise what they are researching like it is being done in the US, states Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw, chairman, Vision Group on Biotechnology, government of Karnataka, president, ABLE and chairman, National Biotechnology Task force, CII (Confederation of Indian Industry) and CMD Biocon Limited in conversation with Pharmabiz's correspondent.

Was there a special effort to attract pharma companies to Bangalore Bio this time?
Not exactly. Pharmaceutical companies today are increasingly moving towards biotechnology. This time pharma majors like Ranbaxy are participating because they are interested in marketing biotech products. The list of entries, for Bangalore Bio shows its comprehensive mix of biotechnology services like bio pharmaceuticals, diagnostics, Bioinformatics agri biotech etc.

How do you see biotechnology in the State?
Bangalore has become a biotech hub because Karnataka is the only state that has a biotech cluster in the country. Companies setting up base in Bangalore include a cross section of agri, pharma-biotech, environmental biotech, Bioinformatics and IT-enabled bio companies. This shows that Bangalore will have a broad-based representation of the sector. There is a lot of future for the biotechnology sector in the State.

The Vision Group's Bangalore Declaration highlighted, long gestation period of "bio-businesses" and high risks of commercialisation associated with regulatory approval processes, what is the scene now?
There has been a tremendous progress in the regulatory front because we have the Mashelkar and Swaminathan Committees on Regulatory Reforms in Biotechnology, both constituted to address regulatory process and recommend measures to restructure the regulatory process for recombinant products in the country. From that point view, the awareness process for the regulatory issues has been very strongly profiled. It started with first edition of Bangalore Bio.

How do you propose to address the problem of seed capital for India's emerging scientist entrepreneurs?
We intend to encourage young scientist entrepreneurs who are actually conceptualising new business ventures and trying to commercialise what they are researching like it is being done in the US. For this we need seed capital. There are two ways of doing it. One is, if these young scientists get into an industry-academia partnership under the new millennium leadership in technology (NMITLI) programme, then they will be encouraged to start up companies. They will then need money and so we need to give them seed funding. Even if it is not an outright grant, it can be given it as a soft loan. This will be an affordable funding model for such scientists. When we encourage them through industry-academia partnerships, they will start understanding how the industry thinks.