Mumbai outpaced Bangalore, with a small margin of about Rs. 200 crore, to become India’s Top Biotech City in terms of revenue while Bangalore-based biopharmaceuticals firm Biocon, known for insulin and cancer drugs had the highest revenue in 2009-10.

Biocon topped the Biospectrum-ABLE list of 'Top 20 Biotech Companies' after a gap of four years growing at 29.34 per cent to record revenues of Rs. 1180 crore.

The Indian biotech industry has grown 3-fold in just 5 years to report revenues of US$3 billion in 2009-10, a growth of 17 per cent over the previous year.

This has been revealed in the 8th annual survey conducted jointly by the Association of Biotechnology Led Enterprises (ABLE) and monthly journal, BioSpectrum, from the CyberMedia group, based on inputs from over 150 biotech companies.

The Biopharma sector contributed nearly three-fifth to industry’s revenues at Rs. 8829 crore, a growth of 12 per cent followed by Bioservices at Rs 2639 crore and Bioagri at Rs. 1936 crore. The remaining revenue came from the Bioindustrials segment with a contribution of Rs 564 crore and Bioinformatics at Rs 231 crore.

The sunrise sector earns a little more than half its revenue from exports. Biopharma and Bioservices sector contributed 63 per cent and 33 per cent to the total biotech exports respectively. The Bioagriculture, Bioindustrial and Bioinformatics Sectors remained focused on domestic operations bringing in nearly 90 per cent of their revenues from India.

The BioSpectrum study notes that the biotechnology ecosystem has become strong with technology providers and the biotech education sectors playing a key role.

“Overall, there is cautious optimism within the biotech industry and the recent government efforts to boost the infrastructure and support for various industry initiatives will bring succor for the industry,” says Narayanan Suresh, Group Editor of BioSpectrum.

Biocon, Serum Institute top biotech companies

Bangalore-based biopharmaceuticals firm Biocon, known for insulin and cancer drugs had the highest revenue in 2009-10. It topped the Biospectrum-ABLE list of Top 20 Biotech Companies after a gap of four years growing at 29.34 per cent to record revenues of Rs. 1180 crore.

Pune-based Serum Institute of India, that makes one out of every two vaccines produced in the world, slipped to No. 2 position with revenues of Rs. 850 crore. Last year, Serum was the first company in India approached by the World Health Organization to develop and manufacture the H1N1 vaccine to fight the swine flu pandemic.

Panacea Biotec, Nuziveedu Seeds and Reliance Life Sciences were ranked No 3, 4 and 5 respectively.

The New Delhi headquartered pharmaceuticals, biopharmaceuticals and vaccine maker, Panacea Biotech, played a key role in eradicating polio by supplying over six billion doses of oral polio vaccine to the Government of India and UNICEF.

Nuziveedu Seeds Limited (NSL), the largest hybrid seed company in India, sold nearly 7 million packets of BT cotton seeds in 2009-10 giving it a market share of 36 per cent as also the number one supplier of rice seeds status in the private sector.

Reliance Life Sciences, earned 70 per cent of its topline growth from biopharmaceuticals. The company has set up the first cord blood repository in South Asia and offers cord blood banking services to public.

The next 5 positions went to Quintiles, Rasi Seeds, NovoNordisk, Shantha Biotech and Mahyco.

Mumbai outpaces Bangalore

Mumbai outpaced Bangalore, with a small margin of about Rs. 200 crore, to become India’s Top Biotech City in terms of revenue.

Western India continued to dominate India’s biotech industry with 46 per cent share in the overall revenues of Rs. 14,199 crore. The 137 companies in the region clocked Rs. 6,631 crore during the year increasing the region’s share in the overall revenues by 3 per cent over 2008-09, thus gaining a lead of 6 per cent over the South.

Gujarat’s share in the total revenue grew by about 50 per cent to cross Rs 1100 crore.

Pune’s contribution went down as Serum Institute of India suffered contract set backs.

The West is home to top Bioagri companies such as Monsanto, Mahyco and Ajeet Seeds and MNCs like GlaxoSmithKline, Roche, Aventis Pharma, Wyeth, Quintiles.

Four of India’s top 10 services companies (CROs) are also based out of West, including the No 1 CRO in the Indian industry – Quintiles India (Rs 375 crore).

According to the ABLE-BioSpectrum survey South continues to remain India’s largest Biotech cluster in terms of the number of companies adding 9 new biotech companies, highest in the country during the year. The region has 172 biotech companies (compared to 137 companies in the West) which posted revenues of Rs 5537.68 crore during the year making up 39 per cent of the overall revenues.

The Northern biocluster - National Capital Region (NCR) - is home to the top 3 companies, Panacea, Jubilant and Eli Lily, contributing 56 per cent of the revenues from North and about 15 per cent of the overall industry revenue. This cluster is better known for its research institutes and of course, government bodies.

Bangalore-based biopharmaceutical start-up Biovel Lifesciences is looking to exit from the life sciences space and is keen for an early outright buyout. Biovel has been in dialogue with several companies including Ranbaxy, Avesthagen, Shantha Biotechnics Ltd and Orchid Chemicals, it is learnt.

Sanofi-aventis, the world's leading vaccine manufacturer, officially launched the construction of a new Sanofi Pasteur vaccine manufacturing centre in Neuville-sur-Saône, France.

The pharmaceutical and biotechnology industry is in the process of consolidating and down-sizing while trying to maintain R&D productivity. Small and medium-sized companies are trying to make the most of available opportunities in niche segments.