The Hindu Business Line : Biocon looking abroad for good buys

Bangalore, April 22 Biocon is looking at more inorganic growth by buying partial or full stake in products and services companies; the hunt is mainly in the US and Europe, its CMD, Ms Kiran Mazumdar Shaw said.

A few months back, it announced buying 70 per cent stake in German drug e-marketing company AxiCorp and expects to formalise the Rs 174-crore deal this month.

“We wish to make similar inroads into other markets to expand our global footprint,” she told a news conference on Tuesday. The company would make judiciously selected investments in companies that would make a good fit, both in products and in services. But it would certainly not be in a bandwidth of $ 400million as was rumoured, she added.

“We have increased our capital expenditure to support the business expansion that we anticipate across the group. We have a strong balance sheet which we will use for strategic acquisitions and investments.” The Rs 464-crore sale of its enzymes business is to finance the acquisitions.

DRUG PIPELINE

The oral insulin programme IN105 has entered Phase-IIa clinical trials across five sites and the study would be over by August. A longer Phase-IIb stage would follow.

The molecule for rheumatoid arthritis and psoriasis, T1h antibody, was being tested for safety and efficacy at seven sites. “This would add value and enable us to license the molecule later,” Ms Mazumdar Shaw said.

The head and neck cancer drug BioMAB EGFR that is already in the market is being further studied at 11 sites for expanding its use to other cancers.

The focus is now on biosimilars and the challenge of marketing them in the big markets.

CONTRACT RESEARCH

Big pharma MNCs were outsourcing R&D functions such as clinical trials and drug development and “the contract research business base will be a very important one for us,” she said. The company was in talks with potential partners for contract research tie-ups on the lines of the one it struck with drug major Bristol Myers Squibb.

“Biocon is an interesting partner for others who get to use Clinigene and Syngene. Good business is coming our way. These are important and exciting times for us.”

The Indian profile in biopharma was rising even as quality concerns about Chinese products were helping Indian companies.

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