Pharma boom in Hyderabad

[hyperbole]

 

Sudipta Sengupta | TNN | Updated: Sep 23, 2019, 22:52 IST

HYDERABAD: With one-third of the world’s vaccine demand among children shipped from its doors in Hyderabad, Genome Valley has now emerged as India’s top life sciences cluster, beating Bengaluru and Chennai to the game. Touted by many as Asia’s equivalent to the Boston Life Sciences Corridor – the US cluster is the largest globally – Genome Valley is located roughly 60 km north-east of the city’s thriving information technology hub, and houses about 200 major firms that employ more than 10,000 scientists. 
Driving this massive supply are pharma majors such as Bharat Biotech, Shantha Biotechnics, Indian Immunologicals Limited and Biological E, among others. Some of the vaccines supplied are: Tetanus-Diphtheria (combination), Pentavalent, Japanese Encephalitis, Rotavirus, Typhoid Conjugate and Hepatitis B&C. 
“Collectively, India contributes 70% of the world’s vaccine requirement. Apart from Genome Valley, the rest is supplied by Serum Institute of India, Pune,” said a scientist from Genome Valley. It’s limited workforce – in comparison to other clusters in India – is because Genome Valley is a “new cluster that has been “systematically planned to develop new-age solutions to bio tech products” and is not clubbed with pharmaceutical and bulk drug industries, as is the case in other places,” he added. 
While the last three years alone have seen Genome Valley draw investments of Rs 6,000 to Rs 6,500 crore, there’s more in the pipeline, said Shakthi M Nagappan, director, life sciences & pharma, of Telangana government. “We have also created a company, Life Sciences Infrastructure Ltd, to raise equity funds worth Rs 1,000 crore to support the growth of pharma and life sciences in Hyderabad. This is the first of its kind fund in India. Our aim is to create assets worth Rs 3,000 to Rs 3,500 crore in the city,” he said. 
With a string of top-end brands from Switzerland, Canada and even India like Ferring Pharmaceuticals, Syngene International, Jamb Pharmaceuticals among others making their way into the cluster, authorities are confident of realising this goal soon. 
“Genome Valley has added value to Hyderabad,” said Dr K R Kumar, managing director of the Madrid-based drug major, Chemo Formulations, the first Spanish drug company to set foot in India. It’s base in Hyderabad is the only other finished product research and development centre, outside of Spain. 
“In our phase 2 development at Genome Valley, expected to be up and running by 2020, we will go commercial and are expecting to manufacture 500 million tablets every year. Also, after the success of oral R&D, we are now planning to bring injectables R&D to Hyderabad, which is only available in Spain now,” Kumar said. 
Biological E recently launched the measles rubella vaccine – only the second in the world to develop the product. While it has four facilities at Genome Valley, it is eyeing a further scale-up. The company’s COO, N Laxminarayana attributed the growth to two reasons, a high-quality ecosystem that supports R&D in biotechnology and a talent pool. 
“The high-quality innovation here has led to a reverse brain drain,” he says. “Unlike earlier, expats are more than willing to return to India,” In his eight-member team of senior executives, three are expats. 
Genome Valley has not only attracted innovator companies like Novartis, Ferring, GlaxoSmithKline and Nektar but also houses global contract research organisations (CROs) and contract development and manufacturing organisations (CDMOs). Among these are Syngene International, Sai Lifesciences, Slayback Pharma and Lonza. “This has created a unique co-location which has now become the USP of Genome Valley,” says Vishal Goel, partner, Cerestra Advisors Limited. He has been closely associated with the cluster since its inception in 1999. 
Genome Valley 2.0 takes shape
Buoyed by this success and rush of big-ticket companies, the Telangana government has green-signalled further development on another 2,000 acres of land as part of its ‘Genome Valley 2.0’ initiative. By 2021, a fresh supply of two million square feet is expected to be readied at this site that currently has a built-up area of over 3.2 million square feet. Jostling for space here, along with Indian majors are global frontrunners like Novartis, DuPont, Chemo among others, each of them eyeing further expansion. There are also two dozen fledging firms in its incubators.

[NenuEvaru]

But these industries bring lot of pollution, there should be strict practices kept in place ..

[sattipandu]

kukatpally and suburbs side chesina gabbu saalu ra ayya

gattiga bore esthey chemical water vasthaayi IDPL deggara 

aa teddy labs odu aythey oka range lo nala loki vadilinadu pollutants 

[samaja_vargamana]

LB  nagar lo SIRIS factory checina kampu antha intha kadhu.