India's Biocon May Consider A US Listing In 2 To 3 Years

BANGALORE, India -- Biocon Ltd., Asia's largest insulin maker, could seek a listing on a stock exchange in the United States for better access to the world's biggest pharmaceuticals market, but the option will have to wait for now, Chairman Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw told reporters in Bangalore Tuesday.

A U.S. listing "will always help ... but it can happen after two years or three years" said Mazumdar-Shaw, who recently raised 5.5 billion rupees (about $83 million) by taking Syngene, a contract research services unit, public in Mumbai.

Currently, the company is more focused on getting regulatory approvals for its various products in the U.S. and Europe, Mazumdar-Shaw said. She was speaking at the inauguration of a new plant to assemble disposable insulin pens, at the company's Bangalore facility.

Biocon, which began in Mazumdar-Shaw's garage in Bangalore in 1978, now sells biotech drugs to treat breast cancer and psoriasis, in addition to insulin, which the company also sells in the U.S., in partnership with Mylan Pharmaceuticals.

The disposable pen was designed by U.S. firm Becton Dickinson and will be sold under the brand name Basalog One. Biocon can assemble 10 million of them in a year at the new factory, with the ability to increase that capacity four-fold, according to Mazumdar-Shaw.