Karnataka Biotech Park, 'Bangalore Helix' phase I, will be commissioned in the third week of February. Investments for the Park will be raised by three fold according to MN Vidyashankar, Karnataka secretary for Information Technology, Biotechnology and Science & Technology.

The total investment planned for the Park is Rs 5,500 crore and is spread over 106 acres at the Electronics City, off Hosur Road in Bangalore. The state government promoted Bangalore Helix under the supervision of the Vision Group of Karnataka and is being constructed under two phases.

Under the phase I, an investment of Rs 11.2 crore has been already made. It is constructed by the National Building Construction Corporation (NBBC) and architects' Jurong, Singapore. The built-up area of phase I is 250,000 sq ft. The construction commenced in October 2006. For the first phase, the funds were allocated by the State government.

For the second phase, the government has inked a pact with the world's leading Biotech Park builder, Alexandria Real Estate Equities Inc, USA under a BOOT (Build Own Operate Transfer) model where the land is leased to the developer for a period of 35 years. The construction will begin in March this year.

Alexandria has constructed 23 biotech parks in the US. This is for the first time that Alexandria stepped out of US for the project. After the Bangalore Helix construction, Alexandria will move on to set up a Biotech Park in Europe. The State government short-listed the US biotech park real estate major after it floated a global tender floated. Alexandria bagged the contract out of a group of 21 developers.

The phase II and III expansion covering 100 acres will have 750,000 sq. ft built- up area. Phase II and III will be equipped with animal house, wet labs, green house and incubation centre.

Once the phase I is commissioned, it will accommodate the Administrative Block, Institute of Bioinformatics and Applied Biotechnology (IBAB) and the Centre for Human Genetics which are presently located ITPL, Whitefield, in Bangalore. The IBAB students hostel is also ready. A part of the operations of Karnataka Biotechnology and Information Technology Services (KBITS) will also shift to Helix.

Going hand in hand with the Bangalore Helix opening is also the launch of India's first Finishing School in Biotechnology that is ready in the PESIT campus in Bangalore. The school will be headed by Dr Malashree Agraahri. Only the syllabus needs to be vetted by the Vision Group. The school is expected to provide a big relief to the growing shortfall of trained expertise. The Karnataka biotech industry is also experiencing an attrition of around 25 per cent annually resulting out of massive poaching among industries, stated the Karnataka IT, BT, S&T secretary.

The Vision Group and the State's Information Technology, Biotechnology and Science & Technology department have now revised the state's Biotech policy, a first in the country in 2001. The revamped version will take care of the industry's needs for the next decade. It will not only continue to be an industrial friendly version but provide the support from seed funding to manpower availability among others.

Karnataka biotech industry accounts for 40 per cent (Rs 3360 crore) of the national biotech sector turnover which is Rs 8,400 crore. While the country has 364 biotech companies, the total number of units in Karnataka is 224. There were 54 new investments came to the state in 2007 alone, added Vidyashankar.