The Hindu Business Line : US co to buy stake in Biocon's subsidiary

THE US-based clinical trials major SCIREX Corporation is buying a small stake in Biocon Ltd's subsidiary Clinigene International and the deal may be closed by the end of this fiscal year, according to Biocon's top officials.

SCIREX is already a strategic partner of Clinigene and has outsourced a small quantum of work to the Bangalore entity.

Ms Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw, CMD of the Bangalore-based biotechnology major, confirmed the proposal, but only added that the new relationship will make the partnership more meaningful, with SCIREX bringing in more projects and business to Clinigene.

The stake would be around 10 per cent and depend on the price, a source privy to the plan told Business Line.

At present, Clinigene does a bulk of trials for Biocon's drug discovery programmes such as oral insulin and a therapy for head and neck cancer. Its third party trial component has been slowly rising, from small bio-studies accounting for five per cent of its activities till the last fiscal to the current 20 per cent. This is expected to swing the full way to 90 per cent in the coming years with SCIREX's now small but global scale entry.

In June this year, the Pennsylvania-based SCIREX, fully owned by the Omnicom group, and Biocon announced their intent to collaborate in global clinical trials through Clinigene, set up in 2000. SCIREX, among the top 20 contract research organisations worldwide, has done 1,000 clinical trials and was said to be on the look-out for an Asian partner to do trials on Asian populations. The two are apparently in the process of exchanging people.

The Indian potential lies in being a major market for MNC pharma products, and, thereby, a key locale for clinical trials prior to drug launch; the scene is untapped and attracts projects conservatively worth $10 million.

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