interview
DR RAJIV MODI
Consolidating Market Position by Building Robust Pipeline and Enhancing Product Portfolio CPL Biologicals, a joint-venture by USA based Novavax Inc and Cadila Pharmaceuticals Limited India, aims to create a diversified range of quality products through inhouse Research and Development along with co-development and joint ventures opportunities. “We will leverage our inhouse innovative technology and R&D c a p a b i l i t i e s , a u g m e n te d by s t r a te g i c partnerships to take leadership position in chosen biologics market segments," says Dr Rajiv Modi, CMD, CPL Biologicals Pvt Ltd. Following are the excerpts of the interaction with Mahesh Kallayil. Could you please tell us about CPL Biological's journey so far? Based in Ahmedabad, India, CPL Biologicals Pvt Ltd is an independent joint-venture biotechnology company established in 2009 by Novavax Inc, USA and Cadila Pharmaceuticals Limited, one of India's largest privately held pharmaceutical companies. The company develops vaccines based on Novavax, Inc's Virus Like Particles (VLPs), recombinant nanoparticles and adjuvant technologies, which are groundbreaking innovations that improve global health through safe and effective vaccines. CPL Biologicals conducts end-to-end research, development and manufacturing based on these technologies in India. The current biologics and diagnostics portfolio of CPL Biologicals comes from original technologies developed at Cadila Pharmaceuticals. CPL Biologicals is currently developing new biologics and diagnostics products on its own. The company has a strong management team comprising of deep expertise and experience in the areas of Research, Process Development, Medical Affairs, Manufacturing, Commercialization etc and is governed by the Board of Directors with representation from both Novavax and Cadila leadership. 8 ď‚ƒOctober 2016
What are the key thrust areas for CPL Biologicals? CPL Biologicals has a three pronged approach to providing novel, affordable solution for global healthcare via vaccines, biologics and diagnostics with integrated capabilities from early stage research and development to clinical and commercial manufacturing along with dedicated sales and marketing teams. The strategy is growth oriented, realistic and focused on biologicals. For vaccines, along with the vaccines based on VLP and Nano-particle technology, we also have an innovative Pancreatic Cancer Vaccine, completely developed in India, in phase I human clinical trial. This cancer vaccine is a platform technology and can be applied for other types of cancers as well. We will leverage our in-house innovative technology and R&D capabilities, augmented by strategic partnerships to take leadership position in chosen biologics market segments. We are expanding our presence in the biologics area with novel and biosimilar antibodies based therapeutics in oncology. In diagnostics, we are developing novel immunediagnostics for infectious and non-infectious diseases to prov ide c omplete s olutions for g lob al he ath Pharma Bio World