Bangalore scores an A in Biotech

The fusion of science and innovation that is biotechnology can help us overcome many grave threats to the future of our very existence. The application of human ingenuity to biotechnology can give us viable answers to the survival challenges that we face—disease, hunger and a polluted planet.

Biotechnology is a remarkable enabler as well as a great leveller. Since the industry’s birth in 1976, commercialisation of cutting-edge research has helped millions of people improve their quality of life. It is providing affordable treatment and innovative cures for a wide range of diseases, offering greater food security in the face of ever-increasing pressure on land, and promoting environmental sustainability in an ecologically fragile world. Most importantly, biotechnology’s cost-effective revolution is empowering developing economies to meet the needs of its people and bridge the rich-poor divide.

The promise of biotechnology is immense for India, where the population, growing exponentially and lacking access to food and healthcare, is unable to progress economically and socially. Biotechnology can help India realise its potential. With its sizeable biotechnology cluster, Bangalore is the heart of this endeavour.

Close on the heels of the IT juggernaut, 200 of India’s 370 biotech companies have set up shop in the city, making it the country’s largest biocluster. With a turnover of Rs3,000 crore today, the city’s growth as a hub began in 1978 when India’s first biotech company, Biocon, was set up. However, as we slowly built the company, the sector began to evolve and by the 1990s, attracted by our success, several other companies were established.
The Bangalore Biocluster stands out because of its diversity and high level of innovation.

The city’s biotech players work in networked clusters rather than in isolation, enabling all to thrive: The sector outsources what it requires rapidly and cheaply, which spurs the growth of ancillary biotech companies, thus, strengthening the cluster effect. Feeding on the success of its constituent units and the culture of interdependence, Bangalore’s biotech sector has not looked back since its inception.

Several custom research companies, engaged in molecular biology and chemical synthesis-based research services, are spurring India’s growth in biotechnology. Others are taking bio-informatics research and development to the next level. For example, Strand Genomics has developed a number of proprietary software tools for data mining and drug discovery while Biocon has filed more than a 100 patents and produced the country’s first indigenously produced novel monoclonal antibody. Biocon has developed a novel bioreactor, aiding the production of enzymes followed by high-value bio- pharmaceuticals.

Clinigene started its CRO efforts by researching biomarkers for Type II diabetes, Gangagen Technologies is developing a range of proprietary phage-based products, Metahelix and Avesthagen have novel innovations in agri-biotechnology and X-cyton is developing DNA-based diagnostic kits.

A knowledge-intensive industry like biotechnology requires a strong academic foundation, where a creative scientific community provides the ideas that fructify in commercial success. Bangalore is home to academic and research institutions like the Indian Institute of Science, National Centre for Biological Sciences, University of Agricultural Sciences, Stem Cells Institute, and the Jawaharlal Nehru Centre for Advanced Scientific Research which offer a fertile environment to nurture the scientific expertise needed for biotechnology’s growth.

This Life Sciences academic cluster has been critical to the city’s pre-eminence in biotechnology. The sector received a big boost when the Government of Karnataka, along with ICICI, set up the Institute of Bioinformatics and Applied Biotechnology (IBAB) as an international centre of excellence in bioinformatics. 

Moreover, the recently unveiled Version II of the Millennium Biotech policy provides a huge fillip to biotechnology in the state. Offering fiscal incentives to the tune of Rs400 crore and benefits such as investment promotion subsidy, interest-free loan on VAT and financial support for patent registration, the policy goes to show the strong support the sector receives from the government. In a step towards improving the quality of human resources for biotechnology, the government will promote 10 biotech finishing schools selected by the Association of Biotechnology Led Enterprises (ABLE) and the Vision Group on Biotechnology.

The policy aims to establish five biotech parks in Mysore, Mangalore, Dharwad and Bidar, apart from the Bangalore Helix. The government will also initiate a Bio Venture Fund with a corpus of Rs50 crore. It is no wonder that BangaloreBio, the annual international conference and exhibition held to showcase Karnataka’s biotech companies and offer a platform for the exchange of ideas, is a grand success each year.

Bangalore has truly emerged as a favoured biotech destination for the world and our innovations have found wide applications across fields ranging from medicine, agriculture and industry to informatics, biofuels and diagnostics — with encouraging results. The knowledge and techniques of biotechnology can help India and the world overcome many challenges both today and in the future.

Primary among these challenges is healthcare. Pioneering advances in biotechnology have
enabled the discovery and development of innovative medicines that prevent, control and cure life-threatening and debilitating diseases, from diabetes and cancer to arthritis and Parkinson’s. As companies develop novel drugs like monoclonal antibodies that address unmet medical needs and learn more about gene therapy and stem cells, biotechnology is poised to devise newer drugs to help millions across the world.

Biotech innovation is an expensive business as the time and money involved in R&D make most new bio-therapies prohibitively expensive and put life-saving treatments beyond the reach of all but a few patients. With its cost benefits and trained manpower, Bangalore, and by extension, India, has the potential to develop into a leading centre  of affordable and differentiated medicine and personalised therapies. Our low-cost advantage encourages collaborative research with western pharma companies. Innovative partnerships help biotech companies leverage their inherent cost advantage to develop new drugs that are affordable and accessible to all who need them.

Bioengineering is another area that has demonstrated great therapeutical potential. For example, tissue engineering allows doctors to use the patient’s own tissue cells, helping easier acceptance by the body. Nanotechnology, bioengineering and biotechnology offer a new range of advanced biomaterials with improved functionality. Used with tissue engineering, this has the potential to revolutionise organ replacement technology as we know it.

Another future challenge biotechnology is taking on is in agriculture, the mainstay of the majority of Indians. With our burgeoning population and increasing industrialisation, agricultural land bears a heavy burden. Agriculturists are constantly searching for cost-effective ways to increase production without expanding cultivated areas to get the maximum advantage from the land available. In such a situation, biotechnology is crucial to propelling a second Green revolution. India has become the fourth largest adopter of biotech crops in the world and biotechnology’s gifts such as GM seeds, bio-fertilizers and bio-pesticides can be of great value to our entire food chain — from producer to consumer.

Biotechnology is essential for sustainability not only with regard to agriculture, but also in the area of biofuels. With fossil fuel resources expected to dry up in the near future, biofuels show a lot of promise in taking their place. Using biotechnology, one can harness marine algae and produce renewable fuel to help run the planet. Jatropha is another crop that has the potential to be used as a fuel. The major challenge associated with the use of jatropha is that it gives off a toxic protein and the Indian variety yeilds low quantities of oil. However, these can be mitigated with the use of RNAi (RNA interference) technology to remove the toxins, and hybridisation and genetic modification to increase the oil content.

The story of India's biotechnology revolution, and that of Bangalore, is one of determination and innovation in the face of an often unyielding system. Daring entrepreneurs who entered the field with not much more than a dream and grappled with challenges on a daily basis are the true heroes of the saga. Even now, when they have reached the commendable position of having put Bangalore on the global biotech map, they continue to battle poor infrastructure, regulatory issues and meagre  funding. Biotechnology is a high-risk, research-intensive field requiring large investments for research and with long gestation periods that precede product commercialisation.

The government must step in to remove the bottlenecks and act as a catalyst. Evolving and implementing the right fiscal, regulatory and infrastructure policies can go a long way towards helping biotechnology move from research to reality and address the challenges of today and tomorrow.