Merck plans India bio-production plant

Merck KGaA may set up a bio-production plant in India to help local companies create biotechnology drugs and biosimilars, reported livemint.com.

• Udit Batra, chief executive of Merck's life science business, said "we have [a bio-production centre] in France, we opened one in the US, and we will open another one in China because we believe that demand in these three geographies is undisputed, as it is in India."

• Batra indicated that the company will be holding talks with government officials as "we would want to make sure that we have some local customers who would like to use this facility and we want to make sure that regulations are somehow standardized."