Medi Spec Instruments India Ltd (MIIL) involved in marketing and serving of analytical, medical and diagnostic products is looking at doubling its revenue during the financial year 2004-05 over last year's revenue of Rs 10 crore. To achieve this, the company is looking at recruiting more field staff. Vipul Chhatbar, director, MIIL, said, "At present our field strength is 21. And by the end of this year, we want to increase it to 30. We are launching a couple of new products in July."

MIIL provides sales, marketing and technical support, and consultancy for companies who wish to and desire to penetrate the rapidly growing Indian market. This ISO 9001:2001 certified firm represents 16 overseas manufacturers in India for their diversified laboratory product range with its thrust on biotechnology and molecular biology. It caters to a large market segment and its customer base includes companies from the pharmaceutical, biotechnology, food, clinical, and medical laboratories to government research institutions and universities. Chhatbar added, "Ours is the only supplier company which has the ISO 9001-2001 certification. To the best of my knowledge, even the MNC suppliers don't have this certification."

Replying to a question on competition in the suppliers' segment, Chhatbar noted that there are many players in this field as the margins are as high as 15-20 percent. Some times, it would be even more. Five years ago, for gel documentation systems, there were only five competitors, but now there are over 20 companies competing for the same product.

Life sciences contributes 15 percent to SAS India's total revenue

SAS India, a provider of new generation business intelligence software and services, is expected to grow at about 40 percent in 2004 as against 30 percent last year. In 2002-03, the company's estimated revenue stood at Rs 40 crore. About 15 percent of the revenue (Rs 6 crore) is from the life sciences sector. Most of the Indian clinical research organizations such as SIRO Clinpharm, Novartis, Pfizer, Quintiles, and GSK are its clients. Besides life sciences, it does provide services to IT&ITES, telecom, and financial companies.

Vivek Gokarn, managing director and CEO, SAS India, informed, "The Indian pharmaceutical industry is growing at a fast pace and companies are investing in their R&D activities to face the international challenges. The CRO segment is mushrooming up in India too. These are very active in conducting Phase I-IV clinical trials.

SAS provides a complete solution on data warehousing, analytics, data management, data analysis, clinical research and traditional BI applications to create intelligence from massive amounts of data."

It recently introduced SAS 9—a platform with enhanced analytics and refined user interface that provides fresh insights for solving business problems and driving competitive advantage. Don Cooper Williams, director, marketing and alliance, SAS Asia Pacific noted that India has taken a lead in life sciences sector and is far ahead over China. The revenue contribution of life sciences in SAS Asia Pacific is about 9 percent as against India's contribution of 15 percent while that of the SAS worldwide is just 7 percent.

Genetix's revenues up

Genetix Biotech Asia Pvt Ltd registered 40 percent growth in its revenues during 2003-04 to record Rs 25 crore in sales. Satisfied with the progress, Arun Prakash, managing director, Genetix Biotech, informed that the company is now eyeing to notch Rs 35 crore in revenues by the end of current fiscal year. Prakash added, "Now our thrust will be much more than last year. More companies are going to come with us. Very soon a few new companies that are leaders in their segment would be coming to India through Genetix."

Hysel to distribute HyClone's products

New Delhi-based Hysel India Pvt Ltd will distribute HyClone products in the Indian market. HyClone is a global supplier of cell culture and bioprocessing systems for application in research and production. This US-based company is widely known as the premier supplier of quality FBS and other sera for cell culture. HyClone also manufactures classical media and new serum-free and protein-free media formulated for commonly used cell lines.

In addition to sera and media, the company also provides BioProcess Containers (BPCs)—sterile, disposable bags of medical grade film ideal for transport, dispensing and storage of sterile liquids. "HyClone media, buffers, and WFI are available conveniently packaged in BPCs. And these BPCs may also be custom configured for particular applications," informed VS Narayanan, director Hysel India Pvt Ltd. He further added, "HyClone has also pioneered the use of high retentive filtration techniques including triple 100 nm and 40 nm pore size rated filters to ensure sterility." Another director of Hysel, Vijay Chugh informed, "So far the response from the industry is good. The company's product range is widely used by eminent research institutes, pharmaceutical industries etc. Since, HyClone is a leader in its market segment, almost all the concerned people of the scientific community are well aware about quality of its product."

Bio-Rad receives USDA permit for BSE test

The California-based Bio-Rad Laboratories, a manufacturer and distributor of life science research products and clinical diagnostics, announced that its rapid TeSeE test used for the detection of Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE), also known as mad cow disease, has been licensed by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) for use in the National Veterinary Service Laboratories (NVSL) in Ames, Iowa and all the NVSL network laboratories as part of the USDA's newly enhanced BSE testing program. It is estimated that this new program will test approximately 400,000 animals over the next 12-18 months.

IDT ties up with Imperial Bio-Medic

Chandigarh-based Imperial Bio-Medic (P) Ltd and Integrated DNA Technologies Inc. (IDT) joined hands for capturing the Indian custom DNA synthesis market. Neeraj Gupta, corporate vice president, Imperial, informed, "We have recently signed an MoU with IDT and are looking forward to strengthen our relations. They are worldwide leaders in custom DNA Synthesis segment. We firmly believe that together we will attain good heights in the Indian market as well. The product range that IDT is offering includes almost every aspect of high-end research. Since R&D is becoming a buzzword these days, we can predict good days ahead for us."

IDT now routinely fulfills large-volume orders consisting of hundreds of thousands of oligonucleotides. Today, virtually every oligo synthesized is thoroughly tested by mass spectrometry and must pass strict quality control guidelines to be shipped to customers. In addition to improving the quality of custom synthesized DNA, IDT has increased the speed at which customers receive oligos with unique SameDay oligo synthesis and Rapid HPLC purification services. With the kind of spectrum, which has been offered by the principle company, Imperial Bio-Med is looking at the Indian market with a confident approach of capturing this niche egment of Indian research community.

Regulators approve Pall's drug purification process

Pall Corp. announced that, with collaborators from BioMarin Pharmaceutical Inc., it would present data that demonstrates significant new advances in the safety and economy of protein purification. BioMarin is the first company to receive licensure from the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the European Medicines Evaluation Agency (EMEA) for a drug product using a Pall dual membrane-based process, setting a new standard for biological purification in the industry. Pall Mustang Q membrane technology is understood to significantly reduce the possibility of a failed batch due to DNA contamination, an extremely costly problem with potential human health implications.

Agilent introduces upgraded proteomics software

Agilent Technologies Inc. has introduced a major upgrade to its Spectrum Mill MS proteomics workbench. The Spectrum Mill workbench is a suite of software tools for confidently identifying proteins from mass spectrometry (MS) data, determining protein expression levels and correlating data from multiple samples or experiments. It includes advanced data extraction and searching capabilities that greatly speed protein identification and reduce the number of false positive matches. The software can process data from both Agilent and non-Agilent mass spectrometers. The new version of the Spectrum Mill MS proteomics workbench supports the Microsoft Windows Server 2003 and Windows 2000 Server operating systems.

BBI becomes Sartorius BBI Systems

Melsungen-based B Braun Biotech International GmbH (BBI), a manufacturer of fermenters and bioreactors and a subsidiary of the Sartorius Group, has a new name with effective from March 1, 2004 and will now be called Sartorius BBI Systems GmbH. This change of name also entails an alteration of the company's visual appearance. Sartorius BBI Systems will adopt all essential components of the Sartorius Group's corporate design.

Amersham Biosciences advances gene expression

Amersham Biosciences, the life sciences business of Amersham, announced the addition of the CodeLink human whole genome bioarray to its CodeLink range. The first CodeLink bioarray to offer comprehensive genome-wide expression profiling of an entire genome is the result of significant advancements made to the CodeLink platform. This new whole genome bioarray enables researchers to significantly discover more by consolidating genome-wide expression profiling into a single chip microarray experiment and increasing the assay sensitivity.