The rapidly evolving Indian biotech industry while making efforts to tap the domestic opportunities, is also now making inroads into the global markets in a big way. The sector now offers new products and technology to combat disease and develop efficient manufacturing processes.
“Indian biotech has come of age and it is gratifying that it is now a $8.5 billion sector. The sector is all poised to touch $100 billion by 2025. Specifically with reference to bio-pharma, we see the growth contributors would be vaccines as one third of the global children are inoculated with vaccines from India. Biosimilars and biologicals are proving to be the hub of manufacture from the emerging markets and India will take a lead in the same", said Kiran Mazumdar Shaw, chairperson Vision group on biotechnology and chairman-managing director, Biocon Ltd.
In this context , Bangalore India Bio - India's biggest and most sought-after biotech forum holds special significance since it plays a major role in connecting the vibrant Indian biotech industry with the international life sciences sector.
Bangalore India Bio is an annual event organized by the Department of Science & Technology Government of Karnataka, under the guidance of Vision Group of Biotechnology. Since 2001, Bangalore India Bio has been instrumental in promoting the inherent strength of the Indian biotech industry to the outside world and is now acknowledged as the biggest and India's national event on life sciences.
In its 15th year , Bangalore India Bio with the theme ‘Crystallizing India’s Biotech Future’ intends to tap the significant opportunities in the biotechnology sector not just in bio pharmaceuticals, but in development of cleaner energy, agriculture and environmental sciences. The event will look into the rapidly evolving and changing future of biotech and its impact in India.
The event being held from February 9 to 11, 2015 at The Lalith Ashok , will showcase top notch start ups. There will also be a global biotech conclave creating biotech clusters under one roof.
The event will identify challenges and opportunities from funding into basic research to regulatory and policy action and draft a roadmap for the sector’s growth.
The trade show will serve as a market place for biotech companies and industry service providers to do business and close deals. Pre-scheduled partnering meetings will enable to assess and connect with potential partners. The conference will address latest researches, business models and strategies, alliances and partnering trends, product innovation and licensing and regulatory issues.
"The 15th edition of Bangalore India Bio has new initiatives like Top Guns Talks, Young Guns Roundtable, a Secretaries Conclave, a Global Biotech Conclave, networking events etc. This event is an excellent platform for great minds to showcase their expertise and empower young entrepreneurs. We expect the existing formats of Multi-Track Conferences, International Tradeshow, Distinguished Lectures and Talks, Bio Excellence Awards, BioQuiz to mobilize participants. The Top Guns Talks is a session where keynote address will be delivered by the global leaders from science and industry sharing their vision for this industry. The Young Guns Roundtable is aimed at bringing together all the rising stars of the biotech fraternity to discuss on "Going Beyond the Start-up with effective Scaling Strategies", says Dr P M Murali, President – Association of Biotechnology Led Entrepreneurs (ABLE).
This edition will have over 22 conference sessions and a large international presence from the UK, Scotland, USA, France, Germany, Holland, Singapore, Korea, Japan, Australia among others.
Collaborations and partnerships
The sector has witnessed a slew of collaborations and joint ventures in research and development recently.
In December 2014, Bengaluru-based Polyclone collaborated with Spain’s Biochemize to advance its offerings in enzyme engineering. The segment has many applications across the interdisciplinary sub-sectors of biotechnology. The collaboration is a result of the European Business and Technology Centre (EBTC) last year, where a partnering session was organised to foster EU-India business and research relationships.
Biochemize S.L. is a biotechnology company focussed on the design and development of processes based on biocatalysis and microbial fermentation for the manufacturing of active pharmaceutical ingredients. Under the pact it would utilise Polyclone’s in silico enzyme engineering framework (eEF) to strengthen its core services.
“Through this collaboration, strategic synergies between activities and scientific-technological platforms of both companies are reinforced, in such a way that experimental results and the in silico models will boost the capacity for launching new, more specific, high performance engineered enzymes, to better fit the customers’ need for better, safer, more specific, stable and competitive enzymes” said Dr. Jaume Mir, CEO, Biochemize.
Computational tools have aided and accelerated discovery in biotech- pharma industry. Application of advanced techniques like Quantum Mechanics and Molecular Modelling have further revealed unprecedented data points giving a whole new dimension of knowledge to the mechanics of enzyme substrate reactions, said Naveen Kulkarni, CEO of Polyclone.
“Our in silico enzyme engineering framework precisely provides this bridge to develop better enzymes, and the partnership with Biochemise brings to the table the knowledge about enzymes and assays that are relevant and industrially important to embark on a journey to bring productivity to businesses”, said Polyclone's chief.
In November last year, Sami Labs charted the inorganic growth path by acquiring KCP Biotech which is part of the 73 year old diversified business conglomerate KCP Group in Hyderabad.
According to VG Nair, Group CEO, SAMI Group, the deal value was Rs. 5 crore and the funding source was through the internal accruals of the Rs. 600 crore company. With the addition of this ultra-modern manufacturing facility, which is ISO certified unit situated at the SP Biotech Park Genome Valley, Hyderabad, Sami will now have the big advantage of having a total of seven manufacturing units across the globe.
In the case of Biocon, India’s largest biotech major and the U.S.-based CytoSorbents Corporation, the colloboration have expanded the scope of their strategic partnership for CytoSorbents’ CytoSorb cytokine reduction therapy to treat patients experiencing severe whole body inflammation, often called a Systemic Inflammatory Response Syndrome (SIRS).
Strides Arcolab in 2013, went on to rebrand its Biotech Business as Stelis. Consequent to the re-branding, the company has renamed its wholly owned subsidiaries. The Indian subsidiary Agila Biotech Private Ltd has been re-branded as Stelis Biopharma Private Ltd and the Malaysian subsidiary Agila Biotech (Malaysia) SDN BHD has been re-branded as Stelis Biopharma (Malaysia) SDN BHD.
At the global level, Merck had acquired, OncoEthix, a Swiss-based privately held biotechnology company specialising in oncology drug development. Through the acquisition, the global drug major has gained an investigational, novel oral BET (bromodomain) inhibitor, OTX015, which is currently in phase 1b studies for the treatment of hematological malignancies and advanced solid tumours.
Back home, the Biotechnology Industry Research Assistance Council (BIRAC) has invited research proposals from biotechnology start-ups and entrepreneurs indicating that the sector is sharpening its focus on restructuring business by scouting for collaborations and acquisitions.
In bio-pharma, exciting R&D is taking place in combination vaccines, diabetes research, oncology, stem cell research, medical devices and diagnostics. The bio-agri and bio-industrial sectors are conducting innovative research into crops with improved yields and disease resistant, next generation biofuels and proprietary enzymes that have a role in food, textiles and other industries.
Another important development has been in systems biology with several firms conducting cutting edge work in predictive biology be it in signalling pathway analysis, developing tools to analyse and integrate information such as next generation sequencing and imaging data, as well as developing virtual organ or disease models to facilitate drug discovery.
The R&D services space is expanding creatively, right from modelling to genetic engineering to protein design which is a healthier sign. The cost of research is still not sustainable but for some projects, outsourcing helps to overcome the time and resource limitations. There has been an overall conscious effort to work in a non-infringing environment considering the implications the country has seen in the past, which has added fillip into creative research, said Prashant Nagre, CEO, Fermenta Biotech Ltd.
Vaccines, biosimilars, biologicals which covers mAbs(monoclonal antibodies) and stem cell products are seen to be future growth drivers in the biotechnology sector. While vaccines have proven the single most cost effective means of controlling the spread of infectious diseases. Biotech drugs like biosimilars and biologicals have been shown to have comparable quality, safety, and efficacy to the original product but which are cost effective. Stem cells are considered to have the potential to treat Parkinson’s disease, rheumatoid arthritis, multiple sclerosis, hepatitis, dermatomyositis, psoriasis, muscular dystrophy and even autism.
The total opportunity globally for biosimilar MAbs & Other Biologics is $ 34 billion. Indian companies are watching to tap the potential international market.
This sector has witnessed three emerging trends. Biopharma, which constitutes nearly two-thirds of the Indian biotech sector, invests in innovative product development. Clearly, a lot of companies see more value in ramping up their service offerings even as they try to face the technological, financial and regulatory challenges, before they are able to offer cutting edge drugs in the market place, according to a Federation of Indian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (Ficci) report.
The future growth areas for biotech are diagnostics, drug discovery and development, food security, renewable fuels, climate change that will drive use of green technologies. Therefore research and development spends are important for building engines of future , said Kiran Mazumdar Shaw.
For future growth based on innovation to take place , massive investments are needed in R&D. In Karnataka, the growth is driven by bio-pharma research and development, bio-informatics and bio services.
“Biotech is both a technology for the present and future. Going by the focus areas of the future, this sector will help spur the growth of Indian economy”, she added.