British biotech parks keen on tie-ups in AP

Tuesday, 17 September 2002, 19:30 IST
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NEW DELHI: Leading science and biotech parks from Britain are keen to collaborate with Indian companies for projects in Andhra Pradesh. Britain's Cambridge Park and the ICICI Knowledge Park, based in the Genome Valley in Andhra Pradesh, are already exploring possibilities of such collaboration, according to the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII). Astex, a leading structure-based drug company in Britain, is looking at establishing a presence in India and has initiated dialogue with Andhra Pradesh- based Biocon India, a CII statement said here Monday. Astex is pioneering the use of high throughput X-ray crystallography (HTX) for the rapid identification on noted drug candidates. During a visit to Britain from September 9-13 as part of a CII biotech mission, representatives of the ICICI Knowledge Park studied the operations of Pentland Science Park, Oxford Science Park and the Bioscience Center in Newcastle. The CII mission, led by Biocon India chairperson and managing director Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw included several leading biotech companies from Andhra Pradesh. The mission's program included visits to the five major bioscience clusters of Oxford, Cambridge, Edinburg, Manchester and Newcastle. It also made knowledge- sharing visits to Oxford Glycosciences, Quintiles, Astex, Astra Zeneca, Non-linear Dynamics, Applied Imaging, universities and science parks in the regions. The visit has prompted dialogue between the British centres of excellence and the Indian biotech industry, the CII statement said. Strand Genomics, one of the leading bio-informatics companies in India, is exploring six concrete business leads. Several British companies have confirmed participation in the Biotech India 2003 that will be held February 5-8 to follow up business leads for collaboration. State-owned non-profit organization Invest U.K. too is keen on joining Biotech India and would also urge other British biotech majors to make the trip. "The Institute of Biotechnology and Applied Bioinformatics (IBAB) is exploring the possibilities of taking Indian students for internship in companies like Astra Zeneca, Astex, Cambridge University and Newcastle University in Britain," the CII statement said.
Source: IANS