Singapore: There’s a new kid on the block in the IT industry. Bio-IT spending in India is set to grow at a five-year compound annual growth rate of 65 per cent, to reach $120 million by 2006. The fledgling biotech sector will be the dominant force behind this, with a year-on-year growth of over 90 per cent over this period.

India has the potential to develop into a significant global player over the next decade and beyond, gaining from the crumbling blockbuster model (multibillion-dollar drugs), says the International Data Corporation (IDC), which tracks the infotech industry. IDC believes India will become an ideal centre for outsourcing R&D and drug development processes.

“With global-branded drugs falling off-patent in the next few years, India has the capital infrastructure and proven capabilities necessary to produce vastly cheaper generic drugs which severely undermines brand-names, once their patent protection expires,” says Philip Fersht, director, Bio-IT and Life Sciences Research, IDC Asia/Pacific. “We are witnessing a move away from the mass production of drugs towards mass customisation, with improved diagnosis and personalised treatment at the point of care.”

India has skills in technical computing, bio-informatics and chem-informatics, data integration and the ability to resolve issues surrounding unstructured data. IDC believes pharmaceutical companies will look to outsource these costly areas of R&D to places like India.

Development in biosciences in India will result in heavy investment in IT infrastructure to enable biotechnology processes. This growth is fuelled further from the increasing R&D alliances and collaborations between Indian organisations and those both locally and abroad.