Glaxo expands its R&D base in India

UK-based GSK Consumer Healthcare (GSKCH) has partnered with Kemwell, a Bangalore-based contract manufacturer of pharmaceutical products, to set up its research and development (R&D) facility in Bangalore. The R&D centre is to cater to GSK’s global oral healthcare product development projects.

Greg Grashoff, director global resourcing (new product development), GSK Consumer Healthcare, said, the Global Resourcing (GR) department had identified Kemwell to partner in India to increase the company’s capacity for delivering new products through to the launch phase.

'GSK’s oral care products are toothpastes and mouthwashes under the Aquafresh, Sensodyne, Macleans and Odol brand names. The company has set a target to significantly grow the business by 2013 and it is here we have partnered with Kemwell to speed up our R&D developments,” he said.

“By partnering with us, Kemwell has moved up the value chain from a contract manufacturer to take up contract R&D service,” he added.

Kemwell, which has been a contact manufacturer for GSK for over a decade, has been taking up bottling and packaging pharma products like Neosprin, Crocin, Calpol, Betesol and Ventolin. Now it has entered company’s consumer healthcare sector by taking up oral healthcare projects.

The GSK’s new Oral Care Unit (OCU) at Kemwell has been certified as Good Manufacturing Practices (GMP) facility and this enables the company to take up development activities prior to technical transfer of products for

manufacture. “The company has aligned its interests and is implementing client-specific investments to lower outsourcing costs for our customers and ensure long-term success of the partnerships,” said Subhash Bagaria, managing director, Kemwell.

Without disclosing the amount invested in the R&D facility, Bagaria said, “We are investing in equipment only, as land is our own, to provide R&D services such as formulation and analytical services, stability studies and clinical trial manufacturing in various dosage forms.”

Kemwell in its 20 years of operations has handled contracts with innovator companies in Europe like AstraZeneca, Bayer, GSK, J&J, Novartis, and Pfizer. In 2007-08, it reported a turnover of Rs 350 crore. “The new R&D oral care unit at Kemwell has hired 20 people and has got GMP certification, a requisite development prior to technical transfer of product for manufacture,” said Greg Grashoff.