Hikal appoints Dr. Vadiraj Ekkundi as Head - R&D, Bangalore

Hikal Ltd., the preferred long-term outsourcing partner for leading global life sciences and specialty chemicals companies today announced the appointment of  Dr. Vadiraj Ekkundi as the Head of  its R&D facility in Bangalore.

Dr. Ekkundi comes with over 26 years of experience in the field of Research & Development activities. His experience encompasses a mix of scientific, technical as well as managerial roles. He has occupied various top level positions in leading multinational companies such as Hindustan Lever Limited, Wyeth Laboratories, Atul Products Limited, and Ciba group to name a few.

Dr. Ekkundi has done his MSc from Dharwad University and PhD from Indian Institute of Technology, Mumbai. He has also done his Post Doctoral Research from the Institute of Organic Chemistry, Braunschweig, Germany and the Boston College, USA.

"We are pleased to have Dr. Ekkundi join us. Dr Ekkundi’s expertise and strong leadership capabilities will add immense value to our R&D processes and business" said Mr. Jai Hiremath, Vice Chairman and Managing Director, Hikal.

The Hikal R&D Center in Bangalore provides process research of APIs, AIs and intermediates involving multi-step synthesis. It has a successful track record in developing non-infringing processes and scaling up from lab to kilo to commercialization

About Hikal Ltd.
Hikal is a reliable long-term outsourcing partner to companies in the Pharmaceuticals, Crop protection Products, and Specialty Chemicals industry. The company has been supplying key active ingredients (AI), API’s and intermediates, manufactured using stringent global quality standards, for its customers in the United States, Europe and Japan. Hikal’s advanced manufacturing facilities have been inspected and approved by leading global players in Crop protection and Pharmaceutical sectors. The crop protection facilities are located at Taloja and Mahad (Maharashtra). Hikal’s manufacturing activities are supported by state-of-the-art research centres and pilot plant facilities located at Bangalore and Taloja respectively. The API and pharmaceutical intermediates manufacturing facilities are situated in Jigani (Bangalore) and Panoli (Gujarat), respectively. Hikal has also commissioned Acoris Research Ltd., a state-of-the-art contract research facility at the International Biotech Park, Pune.