RPG Life Sciences plans new plant for fermentation biz

EPP News Bureau - Mumbai

RPG Life Sciences Ltd plans to set up a new plant for the fermentation business. The company has also set a target of almost doubling its export turnover by the end of this fiscal. Addressing the shareholders at the company’s 36th annual general meeting, RPG Life Sciences Ltd chairman HV Geonka said, ‘‘In the fermentation business, the manufacturing process of both Doxorobucin and Cyclosporin have been fully stabilised with improved yields and these products have been accepted well, within the country and in the export markets. Encouraged by this, the company plans to put up a plant that will meet US-FDA standards for the manufacture of Doxorubicin. This will open the lucrative US market for this product to the company.’’

The new plant for Doxorubicin will be adjacent to the RPG Life Science’s existing plant in Ankleshwar. The company will be investing around Rs five crore for this new plant and will be commissioning by the end of this fiscal. The company has set a target of achieving a turnover of around Rs 40 crore as against Rs 20 crore last year in the fermentation bulk drug business.

RPG Life Sciences registered a turnover of Rs 29 crore from the exports during 2003-04. The company sees exports particularly in the global generics segment as a major revenue driver in the future. It has product specific marketing arrangements with leading European and Canadian companies for four generic products which are manufactured at its manufacturing facility at Ankleshwar. The company has steeped up its efforts for export of cyclosporine formulation in Latin American markets as there is substantial demand for this product.

‘‘For the year ending March 2005, the company hopes to achieve sales revenue of over Rs 160 crore which would be almost close to a growth of 35 per cent. The pharmaceutical industry eagerly awaits a new policy and hopes that it will strike a good balance between growth and social objectives,’’ said Goenka.