The Hindu Business Line : Quintiles to expand India operations

Mr Ferzaan N. Engineer, Chief Executive Officer, Quintiles Research (India) Private Ltd, with Mr Dennis Gillings, Chairman and CEO, Quintiles Transnational Corporation, at a press conference in Bangalore on Monday. — G.R.N. Somashekar

Bangalore , April 11

CLINICAL research services leader Quintiles Transnational Corp is looking at ramping up its India operations by entering new areas of activity as well as by raising staff numbers.

Dr Dennis Gillings, Chairman and CEO of the US-based Quintiles, who announced the opening of the Quintiles Data Management Centre here on Monday said Quintiles was exploring setting up a PharmaBio Development arm in India after starting the activity in the US, the UK, Japan and Singapore. In the US, Quintiles has committed $1 billion for this area of activity.

The CRO's domestic activities, started in 1997, are now mainly in the realm of clinical trial, data management for MNCs and a few Indian companies.

Its global services range from clinical trials to product commercialisation, which it says, have been used for 30 of the world's top-selling drugs.

The India operations currently contribute about one per cent of Quintiles' revenue (which was $1.78 billion for the year 2004), Dr Gillings told Business Line.

He hoped this would reach 5 per cent in the coming years, riding on the high-growth environment that domestic biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies are seeing.

Operating out of Ahmedabad, Mumbai and Bangalore centres, Quintiles currently employs 850 people, mainly pharmacologists, medical and bioscience professionals. The Bangalore data management facility alone employs some 200 people. Another 150 would be recruited by this year-end, said the Quintiles India CEO, Dr Ferzaan Engineer.

Clinical research being a core part of drug development and eventual drug cost, Quintiles wanted to push prices down a little and be able to offer three trials for the cost of two, Dr Gillings said.

Trials in India cost 50-70 per cent of the US cost — which could range $1 million-20 million per drug under test.

Dr Oppel Greef, Regional Head, said India could be Asian leader in clinical data related work.

In India, Quintiles works with 15 of the top 20 pharmaceutical companies; conducted 90 trials involving 13,000 patients and in cardiovascular areas, cancer, diabetes, psychiatric and infectious diseases.

While the company looked forward to considerable growth here, US majors were still sceptical about the quality and reliability of work done in India and that was to be overcome.

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