Pharmacy

Biocon has delivered strong multi- Sector growth for the financial year 2011. Commenting on the results, Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw, Chairman and Managing Director, Biocon, stated, "Emerging markets have realized significant and sustained growth for our Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients (APIs), whilst our branded formulations have scripted business success in the Indian market place. Licensing income from Pfizer and others has contributed materially to profit generation this fiscal. Our research services businesses supported by Syngene and Clinigene have signaled a turn around. We are confident this will drive robust profitability next fiscal.

To support our expanding business operations, we expect to increase our employee strength by around 1000 in FY12.1 am pleased to announce the payment of an interim dividend of RS. 1.50 Per share and recommend

a final dividend of RS. 3.00 per equity share as our on-going commitment to building incremental shareholder value.

“The total annual income of Biocon group has increased by 17 per cent year-on-year   (y-o-y), while the total income for the last quarter has gone up by 8 per cent, y-o-y. The biopharma business posted a 26 per cent y-o-y increase in

revenues in the fourth quarter of this fiscal on the back of strong growth in the sales of immunosuppressant’s, statins     and     the    branded formulations segment. The branded formulations   business      posted a combined y o-y growth   of 36 per cent for FY11.

"Biocon's pipeline of innovative and biosimilar molecules as well as marketing partnerships will be the driving force to expand in India and other markets in 2011 and beyond," said   Rakesh   Bamzai,   President, Marketing, Biocon Ltd.

Biocon also announced that it would divest its stake in its German subsidiary, AxiCorp GmbH, to the existing group of promoter shareholders.

The Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MoHFW) of India had set a deadline of 1st July 2010 for all pharma supplies procured by the MoHFW to comply with GS1 Standards for bar codes - this deadline was later extended to 1st July 2011. The MoHFW is responsible for the procurement of drugs, medical devices and other medical supplies for government run Healthcare providers and for various national health programmes, including universal immunization, tuberculosis control, malaria control and AIDS control.

Barcodes are required on primary, secondary and tertiary packaging as part of the anti-counterfeiting effort

• Primary packaging (e.g.: blister strips, vials and bottles) - 2D barcodes

• Secondary packaging - 2D or ID barcodes

• Tertiary packaging (e.g.: shipper or carton) - ID barcodes

The barcodes need to encode a unique product identification code, batch number, expiry date and serial number.

While the domestic drug industry has expressed that such a short time frame could wreak havoc with India's 40,000 crore ($8.5bn) pharmaceutical export business, it is simultaneously working towards complying with these new serialization requirements, or looking for a standalone label inspection and data validation solution that is ready for future traceability initiatives with support for SG1 standards.