Buoyed By Biotech

Ocimum Biosolutions is a one-of-its-kind in the product space in India. The

Hyderabad-based company offers solutions in the space of biotechnology. Founded

in 2001, Ocimum is today a 130-people strong organization with competencies in

LIMS, bioinformatics, microarrays, genomics tools, and custom contract research

services.

The BioIT division of Ocimum Biosolutions specializes in ready-to-use

reliable, cost-effective software solutions for the biotech and pharma industry

with a suite of Laboratory Information Management System (LIMS) and

bioinformatics products such as Biotracker, Toxchek, Pharmatracker, Genchek,

OptGene, Nutrabase, Genowiz, and iRNAchek.  In 2004, Ocimum acquired Microarray division of MWG Biotech,

a world leader in genomics. Ocimum leveraged the acquisition to launch a whole

suite of microarray products. These include Catalog OciChip, Custom OciChip, and

hybridization services.

Ocimum was conceived by Anuradha Acharya, who is also the CEO of the company.

Her husband, Subash Lingareddy, and P Sujata were the co-founders. Lingareddy is

now the CFO of Ocimum. Acharya, an MS in both Physics and Management Information

Systems from the University of Illinois at Chicago, had six years of experience

as an IT professional in the US. Sujata is the key person in Ocimum because she

is the one who had the domain knowledge. Sujata has over 15 years of experience

in Molecular Biology and Biotechnology. She has also worked on DNA sequencing

and Genome mapping at Texas A&M University, US. Says Acharya, “We realized

that biotechnology was a niche and booming area and India would provide a huge

opportunity for technology companies in biotech and pharma.” 

Today, apart from its headquarters at Hyderabad, Ocimum Biosolutions has

operations in the US (Indianapolis) and Germany (Munich) and sales offices and

distributors throughout the world.

Riding on Global Demand



Ocimum's success story can be measured from the number of customers the

five-year-old company has. Says Acharya, “We have over 200 customers spread

across the globe.” That's no small feat by far for a company that is young

by all standards.

Ocimum's customers come from biotech research, pharmaceuticals, and the

hospital industry from all parts of the world. Some of the notable customers are

National Institutes of Health, US; Cerilliant; Dow AgroSciences; Depepartment of

Biology of New York University and Department of Plant Sciences, University of

Arizona. While the lion's share comes from the US, other key customers include

the Max Planck Institute of Infectious Diseases, Berlin, Germany; NRC-IBD

Institute for Biodiagnostics, Winnipeg, Canada; Tecan Austria GmbH, Austria;

National Institute of Cellular Biology, Ireland; UNM Health Sciences Centre,

University of New Mexico; University of Toronto, Canada and National Research

Council, Canada; among others. A truly global company, Ocimum has made its mark

in the international biosolutions platform.

Opportunities Galore



The biotechology industry today, is one of the fastest growing industries in

India after IT. This is what makes the opportunity huge for Acharya and her

team. Ocimum has registered multifold growth rate in the last three years. At a

CAGR of 800%, growth has indeed been quite phenomenal. Says Acharya, “We

expect to keep this growth rate in the next couple of years as well.”

While initial funds came from the founder's coffers, a major part of

Ocimum's seed funding has come from Ficus Enterprises, the world's largest

producer of Sulpha-methoxazole and one of the top three producers of Ranitidine

in India.

While there is always a close possibility of companies of Ocimum's stature

to get acquired, Acharya is not really worried about that at this point of time.

Instead, the team has chosen the organic (CHECK) route to grow. For example, the

acquisition of MWG Biotech's division in 2004 that specializes in bioschips

(DNA Microarrays) for a consideration of Euro 3.6 mn shows Ocimum's commitment

to organic growth strategy. “We are currently looking at acquisitions to fuel

growth. This makes sense for us at this point of time and is in tandem with our

growth strategy.”

Recognition Matters



Deloitte Technology recently conducted a survey on the fastest growing

technology companies in the Asia Pacific region. Ocimum Biosolutions has been

ranked 55th among the 500 fastest growing technology companies in 2005 in the

region. Ocimum has also been showcased at the Nasscom Innovation Awards in 2006.

Interestingly, Ocimum is an R&D company in the R&D space. In other

words, Ocimum creates solutions primarily for institutions in the field of

research. Acharya sees huge opportunity in India as well. She says, “Indian

R&D needs cost effective tools and reagents that we hope to supply.” Once

the drivers are in place, Indian R&D is likely to grow leaps and bounds and

Ocimum wants to be a catalyst in this growth phase. There is one hitch of

course, “More investments are also needed and the government needs to step in

with public-private partnerships,” adds Acharya.

So far the opportunity has been promising for Ocimum's management. Growth

has also been pretty much on track. The only challenge at this stage is to get

employees for the niche domain to which Ocimum caters.

Bhaswati Chakravorty



bhaswatic@cybermedia.co.in