Kendle to light up Mindspace in May

Keeping an eye on expanding into a tier-I data center by next year, Kendle, the fifth largest clinical research organisation (CRO) in the world, is all set to start its Asia Pacific data management centre at Ahmedabad's Rs 1200 crore IT SEZ Mindspace in May this year. With this, Gujarat's first IT SEZ will kickstart operations.

The $416 million global CRO  has taken up 10,000 square feet space at K Raheja Corp's IT SEZ project developed on the Ahmedabad-Gandhinagar Knowledge Corridor. It will start operations with 50 associates in mid-May and plans to expand it up to 300 associates in the short term. "We have an understanding with the developer that we will take up additional space as we ramp up. We would need around 150 square feet per person. The current space is suitable for starting our operations, but we have plans to upgrade this into a tier-I data center by next year and would eventually require six floors to house the entire operation.", Bharat Doshi, senior director, south east Asia/India, global clinical development, Kendle told Business Standard. The center will start test operations from mid-April.

The Ahmedabad data center will serve as a back-end operation for data management, bio-statistics, analytical work and support of clinical research. Kendle has to other such backend operations in Munich in Germany and Mexico. The company that employs 3700 people worldwide across 30 countries started its India operations in 2004 with an office in Delhi. Besides Delhi, the CRO also has a clinical research facility at Ahmedabad that became operational last year and houses 28 people.

Doshi declined to give out investment figures for Indian operations citing that the Nasdaq listed company did not share country specific revenues. While he did not comment on Kendle's Indian client portfolio, he however, said that they were all multinational companies with some having operations in India.

By 2012, analysts project that more than 65 percent of all FDA-regulated trials will take place outside the United States, according to Kendle. This is reflected in the Indian biotechnology market, which is expected to grow at a compounded annual growth rate of 30 percent, and the Indian CRO market, which is expected to see growth of 49 percent annually.  

Apart from the India locations, Kendle already has a strong footprint across the Asia-Pacific region with offices in Beijing, Hong Kong and Shanghai in China, Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia, Bangkok in Thailand, Manila in Philippines and in Sydney and Melbourne in Australia.

In Gujarat About 16 IT/ITES SEZs have been notified in the last three years, all of which are yet to commence operations due to various reasons. Raheja's Mindspace project will come up in about 95 acres of land near Gandhinagar.