Indian Immunologicals Limited (IIL) has announced an investment of about Rs 700 crore to set up a new animal vaccine manufacturing facility in the Genome Valley, Hyderabad.
The unit is intended to produce vaccines against foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) and other emerging diseases in animals. The facility will create employment of around 750 jobs and doubles IILs capacity of foot-and-mouth disease vaccine production to 6,000 lakh doses per annum.
IIL, a subsidiary of the National Dairy Development Board (NDDB) is already one of the largest manufacturers of FMD vaccine in the world and is the leading supplier of the vaccine to central government's National Animal Disease Control Programme (NADCP).
The Hyderabad-based company is now investing in the greenfield project - a state-of-art fully integrated biosafety level 3 (BSL-3) facility for drug substance (DS) production and respective fill-finish.
While the existing facility in Gachibowli has a capacity of 3,000 lakh doses, IIL’s planned new facility, in Genome Valley's Phase 3, will add another 3,000 lakh doses/annum of FMD vaccine to its capacity.
Genome Valley, India’s first organised cluster for life sciences R&D and clean manufacturing activities, is home to more than 200 companies including global names like Novartis, GlaxoSmithKline, DuPont, Bharat Biotech and Biological E.
“Hyderabad is already regarded as the “Vaccine Capital of the World” and IILs expansion further advances our contribution in terms of global health, not just for humans but also for animals,” said Telangana's IT, industries minister KT Rama Rao on Monday.
Dr Anand Kumar, Managing Director, IIL said, “IIL is on an aggressive growth path and our third vaccine facility in Hyderabad will ensure self-sufficiency for our nation in the field of vaccines, thereby saving the exchequer and farmers several thousands of crores of rupees.”