Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) and Emami Healthcare have signed two memoranda of understanding (MoU), one for the development of standardized phytopharmaceutical formulation to prevent or delay the development of Type-2 Diabetes in people with pre-diabetes and another for the development of standardized herbal or ayurvedic formulation to treat sleep disorders.

The MoUs were signed by Dr Soumya Swaminathan, Director General, ICMR, New Delhi and Dr C K Katiyar, CEO, Emami Healthcare, Kolkata. 

ICMR will mainly support and manage the pre-clinical, toxicological and clinical development phase of the product development programmes, whereas the industry will look after and undertake the chemistry, manufacturing and control (CMC) part of the product development phase.

Emami Healthcare is expected to manufacture the herbal drugs within a period of 18 months. The company will take care of all CMC (Chemistry, Manufacturing, and Control) including pre-clinical toxicology, and later on ICMR will sponsor the clinical trials at AIIMS to prove the safe parameters and effectiveness of the drugs.