Biozeen, the Knowledge Process Outsourcing pioneer in the biotech sector, is on a chock-a-block operational capacity till March 2007. The latest training programme on the cards is for 200 students from the Reliance Life Sciences, Mumbai.

With the biotech sector facing a trained manpower crunch, Biozeen's expertise in training for biopharmaceuticals and quality control documentation is now an industry benchmark in filling the vacuum for professionally trained manpower with a teacher student ratio as 2:1. Although no estimates of skilled manpower shortage is available, companies are struggling on account of high attrition rate and lack of expertise, stated Dr Anil Paul Kariath, president, consulting and training, Biozeen.

Since its inception eight months ago, it has already trained 140 candidates. These represent over 17 leading companies like Biocon, Biovet, Panacea Biotech, Shantha Biotech and Serum Institute. The Institute's training capacity is for 72 students.

The KPO is an effective model for manpower training. At Biozeen, the candidates work in a cGMP compliant fully operational dedicated pilot plant, which is exclusively for training and research. At the company's state-of the art training centre in Bangalore located on the Hennur-Bagalur Road, students get the hands on training in a real bioprocess engineering environment which will allow them to adjust in the bio-pharma or biologics industry.

The training modules include Bio-pharma production-engineering, microbiology, microbial fermentation, animal cell culture, downstream processing, sterilization, filtration, sterile techniques, process equipment design, bio-pharma facility engineering, process equipment automation, CAD for bioprocess engineering, PLC programming-automation and regulatory aspects and documentation.

The company, which is also into consultancy business, has now launched its operations in Pennsylvania as a part of its strategic growth plans. The US operations are at Lehigh Valley in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and this is a maiden step to build a global presence, stated Cherian Philip, co-founder and chairman, Biozeen. The operations were announced during the visit of Dennis Yablonsky, secretary Pennsylvania, Department of Community and Economic Development in Bangalore.

The US represents a large biotech market globally and Pennsylvania has the highest number of pharma-biotech enterprises in the country. Biozeen will leverage the engineering and process knowledge levels in the US and India's growing pool of biotech engineers to create end-to-end consulting solutions for its US customers. "We will focus on regularly training our teams to ensure that they support the business as its grows," stated Philip.

The initial focus of the company at Pennsylvania is to build a small consulting practice for its US clients and then explore an organic as well as an acquisition route to grow to a strength of around 30 to 50 people. "Our objective is to build a long term strategic relationships with customers in the region by offering consultancy services through a team of highly skilled bio-engineering professionals", Philip added.