Biocon plans manufacturing plant at Vizag

Bangalore's infrastructure bottlenecks seems to have forced Biocon to contemplate setting up a manufacturing unit at the Jawahar Pharma City, a special economic zone(SEZ) in the coastal Andra Pradesh city of Vishakapatnam.

Biocon CMD, Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw made this announcement during the 4th BioAsia conference in Hyderabad in mid-February. "Given the current size of Biocon's operations, it is imperative to have a multi-locational strategy to de-risk the business. Biocon had examined several options before identifying the Jawahar Pharma City SEZ as being the most suitable," she said in a statement.

Biocon will continue to invest in its R&D center in Bangalore and also use it as the high value, low volume manufacturing center. "High volume, low value manufacturing needs a lower investment and operational cost base to be globally competitive. The main selection criteria pertained to power supply, water supply, effluent treatment services as well as SEZ," she explained.

Mazumdar-Shaw, however, denied some news reports which said Biocon has bought 50 acres of land in the Vizag SEZ. Biocon's choice of Andhra Pradesh for the expansion plans has been forced by the lackluster attitude of the Karnataka government in extending the much-needed infrastructure facilities to biotech units in the state. The Andhra Pradesh government, however, has been very proactive in wooing industrial units to the state by providing various key facilities.

Biocon has invested heavily at this Bangalore facility to equip itself with 100 percent standby power generation capability, a zero discharge effluent treatment facility and water supply arrangements. Most of these facilities may be offered at the Vishakapatnam SEZ without the companies having to make such investments.

The 2000-acre SEZ in Vishakapatnam is being jointly developed by Ramkey Group and the Andhra Pradesh Industrial Investment Corporation(APIIC).

Ethypharm in licensing deal with Shantha Biotechnics for India

Ethypharm India, a subsidiary of leading French drug delivery company Ethypharm SA, announced on February 26, 2007 out-licensing and supply contract agreements for Ondansetron Flashtab with Shantha Biotechnics for India. As per the agreement, the products will be supplied from Ethypharm's manufacturing facility near Mumbai as finished and packaged formulations and marketed and distributed by Shantha Biotechnics.

Ajey Kumar, chief executive officer of Ethypharm India, said, "Taste-masked and flavored Ondansetron Flashtab disperses rapidly when placed on the tongue. As the tablet does not need to be swallowed with water, it is a particularly useful formulation for patients who have difficulty with swallowing or who do not feel able to drink, especially cancer patients. Introduction of Ondansetron Flashtab showcases our strength in developing innovative solutions in the fast growing NDDS segment."

Ondansetron is indicated for the prevention of nausea and vomiting associated with moderately emetogenic cancer chemotherapy, certain radiotherapies, and the prevention of postoperative nausea and/or vomiting. Ondansetron Flashtab is a particularly useful formulation for patients who have difficulty with swallowing or who do not feel able to drink. It provides an effective alternative to the conventional Ondansetron tablet.

Development Agenda on IPRs gets a big boost

The proposal to establish a Development Agenda on Intellectual Property Rights (IPRs) received a major boost, with the first-ever international meeting on Intellectual Property and development issues related to the Development Agenda concluding its deliberations at New Delhi on Feb 7, 2007. The proposal to establish a Development Agenda contains 111 proposals made by member countries of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO).

A broad consensus was reached on a number of proposals that have special significant for developing countries. Some of these important proposals are: Proposal to strengthen WIPO's technical cooperation program, taking into account the different levels of development of member states in designing, delivering and evaluating technical assistance; To create a WIPO Partnership Program Database, an internet-based tool to facilitate the strategic use of intellectual property by developing countries by bringing together all stakeholders to match specific IPR-related development needs with available resources, thereby amplifying the impact of intellectual property development assistance; To devise innovative ways and means, including the fostering of transfer of technology, to enable SMEs take better advantage of flexibilities as provided by relevant international agreements and to explore policies, initiatives and reforms necessary to ensure the transfer and dissemination of technology to the benefit of developing countries; And To approach intellectual property enforcement in the context of broader societal interests and development-related concerns, in accordance with Article 7 of the TRIPs Agreement.

Participants from 22 countries were generally in favor of carrying forward the Development Agenda and were also of the opinion that some kind of harmonization could be brought in by merging some of the proposals to address concerns of all stakeholders for expeditious consideration in the ensuing meeting of the WIPO Provisional Committee on Development Agenda.

Discussions were held on six clusters in which all the 111 proposals were categorized. The major issues discussed were: technical assistance and capacity building; norm-setting, flexibilities, public policy and public domain; technology transfer, information and communication technology and access to knowledge; assessments, evaluation and impact studies; institutional matters including mandate and governance.

Synergy Environics offers services to create +ve energy spaces

"Pharmaceutical and biotechnology are key industries. Both are growing and becoming increasingly competitive and demanding. Productivity is the need of the hour. Companies are searching for the X factor that will set them apart. Environics is a combination of ancient wisdom and modern science to fulfil that intrinsic need. We create radiation friendly and positive energy spaces at the facilities to improve health, productivity and inter personal relationships," said Ajay Poddar, managing director, Synergy Environics Ltd.

He further said, "It is encouraging to note that the services offered to Nicholas Piramal received positive response. The positive impacts of the energy on people working at the manufacturing plants in pharma and biotech industry will have positive result in producing effective medicines and drugs. "

Synergy Environics so far has energized more than 200 establishments including factories, corporate offices, sites under development, refineries, etc in the last four years. To meet the growing market and needs of the customers he said, "We are substantially increasing our team by inducting more young people to take up a career in this area."

Synergy Environics Ltd, a research and consulting company engaged in energizing people and build spaces, using environics, encourages use of scientific instruments to check the existing harmful radiations and adopt simple, innovative and non–invasive methods to neutralize radiations and enhance positive energy levels.

Advanced Enzyme gets process patent for leather

Advanced Enzyme Technologies Ltd (AETL), one of the leading manufacturers of enzymes and probiotics in India, has received a process patent, 'Eco-Friendly WET Blue Manufacturing', for leather manufacturing. This comes as a relief to the leather industry, as there has been a major cause of concern, resulting in a clampdown on many units by the Pollution Control Board (PCB). The value of the patented process is over $200 million and is purely based on the developed technology. The development of this process and technology including the transfer to the plant scale has taken over two years.

According to a press release, a superior procedure has been used over the conventional procedure to process hides. This process will now allow for better quality of leather in terms of its grain structure. The conventional processing of leather is done using heavy toxic chemicals like lime, sulphide, emulsifiers and salts which lead to health issues of the operators, users and also causes ecological imbalances. Due to this reason the European, Indian and Chinese governments are laying strict regulations for use of eco-friendly products. Hence, there is a need for the industry to look at eco-friendly solutions, and enzymes to effectively address the issue. At present, tanneries are also under tremendous pressure to deal with these issues including pressure on meeting processing cost.

CL Rathi, managing director, AETL, said, "The global Indian market for leather is valued at $98 billion and India has close to 2.5 percent share in the world market which amounts to around $2.25 billion. However, the Indian leather market is expected to double by the year 2010 to $4.5-5.0 billion. This is because leather technology in India is rapidly evolving to produce high quality leather using eco-friendly processes and AETL is proud to be contributing to this technology"

Dipak Roda, general manager, marketing, AETL, said, "AETL has also made a foray into China as well as Bangladesh in addition to India and will be focusing on the leather industry for the next two years. This process will provide a boost for the company in the leather markets and AETL plans to take its success to the American and European countries as well".

Ranbaxy signs R&D pact with GSK

Ranbaxy Laboratories and GlaxoSmithKline have signed a new multiyear R&D agreement that modifies and expands the terms of their strategic alliance established in 2003 to provide Ranbaxy expanded drug-development responsibilities and further financial opportunities.

Under the new agreement, Ranbaxy will advance leads beyond candidate selection to completion of clinical proof of concept. GSK thereafter will conduct further clinical development for each program and take resulting products through the regulatory approval process to final commercialization. Under the original agreement, Ranbaxy conducted the optimization chemistry required to progress drug leads to the stage of candidate selection.

As per the new agreement, Ranbaxy could receive over $100 million in potential milestone payments for a product developed by Ranbaxy and subsequently launched by GSK in multiple indications and up to double digit royalties on worldwide net sales. Ranbaxy will retain the right to co-commercialize the products in India. The new milestones and royalties will apply both to future drug discovery programs and to the two programs currently ongoing at Ranbaxy that were commenced under the original agreement with GSK. This expanded alliance envisages potential work in a wide range of therapeutics of interest to GSK, including anti-infectives and metabolic, respiratory and oncology products.

Welcoming the expanded agreement with GSK, Malvinder Mohan Singh, CEO and MD, Ranbaxy, said, "The agreement presents a unique opportunity to demonstrate the India centric advantages of high quality R&D to deliver value at the cutting edge. I believe the arrangement with GSK is path-breaking and acknowledges the higher level of R&D maturity prevalent today in our state-of-the art labs in India."

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