HYDERABAD: Kiran Mazumdar Shaw, Chairperson and Managing Director of Biocon, India's leading biotechnology enterprise, on Friday announced investment of about Rs. 500 crores for setting up a biopharmaceutical unit in Jawahar Pharma City, a Special Economic Zone near Visakhapatnam.

She told presspersons that work on the project forming part of its expansion plans, could begin in six months employing 500 persons in the first phase.

<137> Meets YSR

<137>Ms. Shaw who met the Chief Minister Y. S. Rajasekhara Reddy earlier in the day, said she had not approached the State Government with any other proposal, but the latter wanted her to set up another bio-pharma unit in the third phase of Genome Valley in Medak district. "We will certainly look into it," she observed.

However a press release from the Chief Minister's Office claimed that she had announced investment of Rs. 1,000 crores. Dr. Reddy handed over the allotment letter for the 50-acre site in the SEZ in Atchutapuram mandal in Visakhapatnam district to her. This marks a significant development, as Biocon is one of the major anchor investors in this SEZ, being developed by Ramky. The company was also taking ten acres in Hyderabad Biotech SEZ being developed by the Andhra Pradesh Industrial Infrastructure Corporation, it added.

<137> Integrated set-up

<137>Set up in 1978, Biocon is an integrated biotechnology enterprise serving partners and customers in over 50 countries. It ranks first in Asia in terms of revenues and market capitalisation and sixteenth globally. It became only the second Indian company to cross-market capitalisation of US$ 1 billion on the first day of listing.

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