India emerging as a leading global centre for biotechnology ecosystem

The climate of public-private partnership, availability of highly skilled human capital, booming infrastructure facilities, and massive policy support are acting as the launchpad for the rapid growth of India’s biotechnology sector.

Pertaining to policy support, in 2024, the Indian government introduced some crucial policy initiatives like the BioE3 Policy and National Biopharma Mission. Under the BIO-E3 Policy—Biotechnology for Economy, Employment, and Environment, the government aims to accelerate research, innovation, and entrepreneurship through initiatives such as Bio-AI Hubs, Biofoundries, and Bio-Enabler Hubs.

The biotech sector often faces the issue of the academia-industry disconnect, and the global outreach of the nascent startups. National Biopharma Mission (NBM) is an industry-academia collaborative mission for accelerating biopharmaceutical development in India.

This scientifically driven enterprise aims at developing an ecosystem for affordable product development and is focused on the four verticals, namely: development of product leads for vaccines, biosimilars and medical devices relevant to the public health need; Upgradation of shared infrastructure facilities and establishing them as centres of product discovery/discovery validations and manufacturing; Development of human capital by eliminating critical skill gap; and technology transfer offices which are responsible for translating knowledge into products and technologies.

To inculcate, nurture, and expand the startup ecosystem in the biotech sector, India has also launched a Bio-Saarthi program in 2025. It is a global mentorship initiative to support emerging biotech startups. It is structured as a six-month cohort-based program that facilitates mentor-mentee engagements and offers personalized guidance to entrepreneurs in the biotech sector. Again, to ensure collaboration between academia and industry, the Bio-Saarthi program has been designed to specifically aim at industry-academia collaboration and positioning Indian startups for global success.One important aspect of India’s biotech policy is seeking overseas expertise, particularly through the involvement of the Indian diaspora. This is a highly welcome move to ensure engagement of the global Indian-origin mentors with mentees in India, offering effective guidance to emerging entrepreneurs in the biotech sector.

Interestingly, India’s demographic dividend plays a crucial role in the current steady growth of the biotech sector in India. First, India’s aging population, rising life expectancy, and increasing purchasing power have created an increasing demand for advanced and personalised healthcare solutions. Secondly, India’s highly intellectually fertile young population, with 47 percent being under the age of 25, and with the 2nd-highest number of STEM graduates globally, is a lucrative ground for a biotech innovation ecosystem. As a result, India has evolved as a preferred destination for MNCs(AstraZeneca, GSK, Eli Lilly, and Bayer) to establish Global Capability Centers (GCCs), with a focus on the life sciences sector.

One significant aspect of India’s biotechnology prowess is its digital transformation through AI, Big Data, IoT, machine learning (ML), and associated digital technologies. With the use of deployment of AI, advancements in R&D by the Indian pharma sector have become highly affordable, allowing players to exploit economies of scale. These digital solutions have solved two crucial problems of the pharma sector, namely batch manufacturing of drugs and long go-to-market time. With the adoption of digital solutions, Indian biotech has entered an era of precision medicine, where drugs can be customized and hold time can be reduced drastically. Moreover, owing to its success in the sector, India is now maintaining a tag as the “pharmacy of the world,” being a global generic medicine supplier for over 200 countries from both developed and emerging markets. By the end of 2022, Indian pharma transformed itself from volume to a value creator.

Over the last three years, a plethora of measures have been taken by the government as well as private entities to expand growth in this sector. Many private entities(biotech startups, hospitals, etc.) have invested in biotech parks, and have signed an MoU with international biotech institutions. Moreover, to ensure inclusive growth, the Department of Biotechnology (DBT) has been focusing on its North Eastern Programme. The programme aims to facilitate biotech-based development in the North East India, through bio–based entrepreneurship, and the goal is to convert the region into a bioeconomy. The programme is currently in its phase-3, starting in 2010, focusing on developing core competence and capacity in various areas of biotechnology through a collaboration of Institutes from North East India with other leading Institutes across the country. Since 2010, hundreds of biotech hubs, the Visiting Research Professorship (VRP) programme, and captive cultivation of selected medicinal crops has taken place, among other things.

There is a widespread acknowledgment in the industry as well as the government that the success of the Indian biotech industry hinges on the growth of its start-ups and the advancement in R&D, to be facilitated by robust and holistic policies, and public-private partnership. Thus, there has been a focus on increasing the number of biotech incubators. Given the rapid rise in its contribution to the economy, the number of startups, and human capital involved in the industry, India’s biotech ecosystem stands to provide panaceatic solutions in various fields like health, agriculture, and the environment.