Viveka Roychowdhury – Mumbai
| Members of the life sciences delegation from Victoria |
As a percursor to the upcoming Super Trade Mission (STM 2013) hosted by the State Government of Victoria, Australia, representatives of 14 companies comprising the Life Sciences Mission, toured India in early February.
Visiting four cities over two weeks, the delegation also participated at India’s two flagship biotechnology events: Bio Asia in Hyderabad and Bangalore India Bio in Bangalore.
Speaking at an industry meet in Mumbai, Professor Andrew F Wilks, the mission spokesperson and Founder, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, SYN|thesis med chem said, “The agenda of this trip was to understand the Indian market better.” He sees a complimentary synergy between Melbourne’s strong biotech and life sciences infrastructure, mostly focused on the early stages of drug discovery and India’s proven capabilities at the later stages of product improvement.
Speaking about his company’s interest in the India market, Wilks said they offer contract research services, drug discovery expertise and a range of research tools and reagents to the pharma industry. They are looking for partners as well as collaborators providing complementary skill sets. The accent is on early stage drug discovery partnerships, as well as venture capital /angel funding to fuel early stage project pipeline, according to him. They are keen to add an India presence to their operations in China.
Some of the delegates already have strong links with India. For instance, one of the recent projects of CSIRO, a government agency with a $1.2 billion budget, was mAb production for Serum Institute of India and PATH. CSIRO has large interests in materials science and engineering and a strong focus on biotech research in Victoria.
Hydrix, another member of the delegation, develops innovative and advanced biomedical products, instruments and systems, all conforming to CE & FDA Class 1 to Class (high risk). Peter Lewis, Director, Hydrix said that his company is looking to assist Indian companies to develop medical devices for international markets.
An interesting example of the opportunities offered the Victoria lifesciences cluster came from Muranex, a private biopharma company based out of Melbourne, Australia. The company is focused on development and commercialisation of innovative products for sepsis and other acute care indications, and was represented by Dr Maurice Fabiani, Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director on this trip.
He spoke about the company’s lead therapeutic product, a clinical anti-vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) compound which has already been proved to be safe and effective in Phase II clinical studies for cancer.
Muranex is now looking to re-purpose the existing compound for a different therapeutic application (i.e. sepsis). Outlining research from the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Centre (BIDMC), a teaching and research affiliate of the Harvard Medical School, Fabiani said the product has a robust IP and patent position with a strong market potential He indicated that part of this trip’s agenda was to look for partners to take it through Phase II clinical studies.
Vishal Srivastava, Director, Knoesis Consulting, a business development company assisting biotech companies in Australia and New Zealand, spoke about his company’s work with biotech, functional foods and other life science companies. Srivastava said that his mission on this trip was to understand the biotech industry and R&D environment in India, develop relationships with biotech companies in India and evaluate partnerships to undertake life science/ biotechnology projects in India.
Another member of the delegation from Victoria, Korn Technologies, has the capability through academic partners to create gene constructs and evaluate them in non Indica rice strains. Roger Kalla, Founder and Managing Director, Korn Technologies said that his agenda on this trip included shortlisting an Indian R&D partner with capabilities in the field of gene transfer into Indica rice as well as glass house trials of GM plants and field evaluation of genetically modified Indica rice.
Other representatives of the delegation spoke of expanding current partnerships with Indian companies, as well as exploring more opportunities in the Indian market.
STM 2013 will kick off from March 4-15, with around 150 companies from 10 sectors other than lifesciences. Depending on the interests of individual sectors, the delegation plans to visit Mumbai, Delhi, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Chennai, Kolkata, Ahmedabad and Pune.