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Reliance's biotech plans spring to life

The Reliance Group, India's largest conglomerate, is making a quiet entry into an unrelated area; biotechnology.

Meet Reliance Life Sciences, an unlisted company about which little is known even within the group.

Among its ambitious projects, the firm plans to provide patients with ReliCord, enriched blood that can be used to treat disorders such as thalassemia, a fatal blood disease, a source close to the project said.

ReliCord is created from umbilical cord blood, which is rich in stem cells, the precursors to other blood cells.

A spokesman for Reliance declined to comment on the biotechnology venture, which is unlike anything Reliance has done before.

The group is best known for India's largest petrochemicals firm Reliance Industries; and the largest private sector company in India by sales, refiner Reliance Petroleum, which raked in revenues of Rs 309.63 billion in the past year to March.

Among its new economy ventures, the Reliance group is investing $5.3 billion in setting up an optic fibre network across India.

TREATING BLOOD DISEASE

The source said the project is probably the first of its kind in India and the first of its kind in the private sector.

The company recently circulated a brochure on placental cord blood to non-government organisations involved in thalassemia care and treatment.

A copy of the brochure obtained by Reuters said placental cord blood could be a lifesaver for children with thalassemia.

"The stem cells from a single placenta are sufficient to rebuild the blood and immune system of a child with thalassemia whose own red blood cells are incapable of carrying oxygen".

The brochure lists other services Reliance Life plans to provide.

They include assisted reproduction, artificial skin products for burns, testing of drugs and cosmetics on artificial skin, anti-cancer drug testing and sterile media for stem cell preservation at low temperatures.

NEW AREA

Analysts have some reservations about the life science project, which will both collect and enrich blood.

"Stem cell research has a long gestation period and needs funds. That shouldn't be a problem for Reliance," said an analyst with a foreign brokerage.

"A lot depends on the people they get. One needs a whole new mode of thinking for research -- it's not like setting up a petrochemical project."

A source close to the project said the collection of samples from pregnant women would begin in August and research would be carried out at Sir Hurkisondas Nurrotumdas Hospital and Research Centre, which Reliance is helping to upgrade.

The blood will be stored at a placental cord blood bank in Bombay that Reliance is setting up, the source said.

Reliance plans sibling donor programmes, which involve collecting placental cord blood from the umbilical cord of a baby who has a thalassemic brother or sister, and using the blood to treat the affected child.

Earlier this month, Reliance bought equipment from a US firm, Thermogenesis Corp for collection, storage and distribution of placental and cord blood.

"The placental cord programme offers some hope to thalassemics, who otherwise die in their teens," said Sapna Jeswani, president of the We Care Trust, an NGO involved in thalassemia screening and treatment.

Thalassemia patients require regular blood transfusions and costly medications, well beyond all but the very rich in India.

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