International collaborations in biotechnology are raising opportunities for India to emerge as a key nation in this growing sector. There is a renewed interest in collaborations with India amongst the developed countries.

New agreement on vision research with Department of Health and Human Services, USA and an amendment to the agreement with Contraceptive Research & Development Programme (CONRAD), USA were also signed by India, last year. Ongoing bilateral agreements and collaborations were pursued with Germany, Mongolia, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Switzerland, UK and USA. Bilateral interactions have been initiated with Cyprus, Norway, Ukraine and EU. The multilateral collaboration including cooperation amongst SAARC countries are also pursued.

A joint call for proposals was made to Finland on science related to vaccine development, delivery system, products and processes; development of new innovative diagnostics, using different technologies like FRET-technologies and drug development: computational biology related to drug development, has resulted in development of eight joint proposals, which are under consideration.

A joint call for submission of proposals was made with the UK. As a result of which, twenty-one joint proposals were received and five have been short-listed on both sides for consideration of financial support.

India and EU have strong competence and competitiveness in biotechnology. Opportunities for partnership in areas such as new discoveries, preclinical/clinical trials and bio-informatics already exist and the potential for collaboration in pharmaceuticals is growing. Other areas of mutual interest, which have been identified are exchanges on disease genomics, including design and development of new drugs, new diagnostic tests and methods for early diagnosis; exchanges in understanding basic biological processes; exchanges on infectious diseases such as TB, HIV/AIDS, malaria); and training in genome information and systems biology. A joint working group on pharmaceuticals and biotechnology is being constituted.

A Protocol of Cooperation with Ukraine Academy of Sciences is being developed by the Department of Biotechnology as part of collaborations with Ukraine.

Global collaborations have been taking place even in the industry front. Biocon has just announced a licensing agreement with multinational healthcare corporation Bayer HealthCare (BHC) for the exclusive marketing and trademark rights for Insugen for the Chinese market. Panacea Biotec on July 11, 2006 has announced an agreement with PT Bio Farma, Indonesia to manufacture and market the Measles Vaccine.