"This is a healthy development," said Nithin Deshmukh, head - private equity, Kotak Mahindra Bank and director Association of Biotech-Led Enterprises (ABLE). |
India stands to gain from the trend of early stage deals becoming more common compared to middle and late stage deals. |
With limited financial resources but high on intellectual resources, India can utilise the opportunity to provide drug discovery services to its foreign collaborators better. |
Clear examples of smaller biotech companies, constrained by capital, entering into alliances to generate revenues are Avesthagen with Sequenom (genetic markers) and Nordic Biosciences (biomarker-based diagnostic kits), and Biological E with Intercell (encephalitis vaccine). |
The 'licensing of manufacturing' approach has also provided small companies an opportunity to generate cash to further their research. A few companies have jointly collaborated with foreign partners for developing new molecules of therapeutic interest, said Alok Gupta, country head, lifesciences and technology at Yes Bank. |
This has given an opportunity for research and development (R&D)-focussed Indian biotech companies to enter early stage alliances. |
There is a business case for creating a corridor to enable companies to undertake commercially-relevant research projects while simultaneously providing an easier access to talented research teams for global corporations, he added. |
With strategic alliances taking place in the biotech sector, the average price paid for early and mid-stage alliances have increased over the years, as compared to a fall in the average price paid for late-stage alliances. |
The pharma companies have also recognised the potential of biotech as tool and there is an increased level of interaction between pharmaceutical and biotech companies as compared to the biotech-biotech interactions prevalent earlier, said Alok Gupta. |
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