KIRAN MAZUMDAR SHAW Believe it or not millionaires do not grow on trees.

They are actually quite hard to come by. However, they do exist. Millionaires are not a myth. They make their millions in various ways. Some inherit it from their family. Others make it the hard way they earn it. Some earn it by being famous movie actors. Some are famous entertainers. Some sign million dollar sports contracts and yet others are simply outstanding entrepreneurs who followed a dream. It is hard for most of us to imagine being a millionaire, nevertheless a billionaire. The average guy in the world today is struggling to keep his head above water. Working day to day for pay .When most of us hear about someone being rich, we think they are some lucky people. But is it luck? Or is it something more? Yes, some people are lucky enough to be born into money. Yes, some are lucky enough to inherit money. But there are a lot of millionaires and billionaires out there, who have earned every cent they have. They have either invested wisely, started a company that has done very well or maybe even come with a product that has done very well. A lot of it may depend on what part of the country that they live in. Some businesses do better in different parts of the world. These people are all entrepreneurs. They are people who have had a dream of some kind. They were determined to not let their dream die. They had faith and belief in their dreams and did not let anyone or anything stop them. I am sure that they may have had people tell them they were crazy or it is never going to work. But a great entrepreneur only listens to what he feels. He will work out the kinks and proceed in what he believes. These people are self-made. A lot of billionaires make their money by being a true entrepreneur. What I mean by this is they know what they want and they go after it. They have the few qualities that are a must for someone to make it, to gain the riches that we are talking about today. They have determination, determination to go and do what needs to be done. Determination not to let anyone stand in the way of what they want to do. They have faith. Faith in their dream or their ideas. They have faith in themselves. They also have belief, again in themselves and in their dreams. The billionaire that we are going to talk about today is definitely a true entrepreneur. EARLY DAYS: The stud lady from India' (born 23 March 1953) is an Indian entrepreneur. She is the Chairman & Managing Director of Biocon Limited a biotechnology company based in Bangalore (Bangaluru), India.
Among the many persons whom Bangalore can proudly call its own dear ones, biotech entrepreneur and CEO of Biocon India Group, Kiran Mazumdar Shaw is definitely one.

Forward looking, driven, enterprising and definitely outspoken, Kiran is everything that one would look to in a woman of her stature.

Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw completed her schooling from the citys Bishop Cotton Girls High School (1968). She wanted to join medical school but instead took up biology and completed her BSc Zoology Honors course from Mount Carmel College, Bangalore (1973) .She later did her post-graduation in Malting and Brewing from Ballarat College, Melbourne University (1975).
Kiran was born and brought up in Bangalore, India and hailed from a middle-class family, which encouraged her to pursue higher education. Following the footsteps of her father, who was chief brewmaster in United Breweries , she went to Ballarat College in Melbourne, Australia, to specialize in Malting and Brewing Technology to become India's first woman brewmaster.

However, after coming back to India, in 1975, Kiran failed to find any lucrative job offers albeit excellent qualification as her chosen profession was completely maledominated.

She worked as a Trainee Brewer in Carlton and United Breweries, Melbourne and as a Trainee Malster at Barrett Brothers and Burston, Australia. She also worked for some time as a Technical Consultant at Jupiter Breweries Limited, Calcutta and as a Technical Manager at Standard Maltings Corporation, Baroda between 1975 and 1977.[2] "It was too rough a job for a woman," she recalls being told.
THE SATARTING:

Kiran struggled for 2 years as a consultant, but later went abroad and found a job in the UK. During her stay in UK, she met Leslie Auchincloss (Auchincloss), the owner of Biocon Biochemicals Limited, an Ireland-based company who was planning to start a business in India. Kiran grabbed this unique opportunity to start company of her own in India. Many advised against giving up her job in order to set up an industry. Kiran was also warned about the difficulties involved in doing business for a woman in India. However, thanks to the support of her parents and her strong willpower, Kiran did not give up the idea of establishing her own business.

Foreign ownership was limited to 30 per cent, and Mazumdar-Shaw seemed an ideal partner. "She was so focused and had such a forceful personality that I knew she could hold her own," recounts Auchincloss. She started Biocon in 1978 and spearheaded its evolution from an industrial enzymes manufacturing company to a fully integrated bio-pharmaceutical company with a wellbalanced business portfolio of products and a research focus on diabetes, oncology and auto-immune diseases. She also established two subsidiaries: Syngene (1994) to provide development support services for discovery research and Clinigene (2000) to cater to clinical development services.

THE PROBLEMS:
In 1979, when Kiran Mazumdar Shaw went to a bank with a loan application for her then biotechnology fledgling company, she was out rightly turned down. All she had was Rs 10,000 and a garage in Bangalore as an office. Her application for loans was turned down by banks on three counts biotechnology was then a new and not much heard word, the company had no major credible assets, and most importantly, lacked the acceptance for women entrepreneurs.

Initially, she faced credibility challenges because of her youth, gender and her untested business model. Not only was funding a problem as no bank wanted to lend to her, but she also found it difficult to recruit people for her start-up. With single-minded determination she overcame these challenges only to be confronted with the technological challenges associated with trying to build a biotech business in a country facing infrastructural woes. Uninterrupted power, superior quality water, sterile labs, imported research equipment, and advanced scientific skills were not easily available in India during the time. Never one to give up easily, she took the challenges in her stride and worked within the limiting circumstances to take Biocon to newer and greater heights.[2]

Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw should have been afraid. Every day for three months in 1985 she waded through a crowd of angry employees to get to her office at Biocon India, a maker of enzymes in Bangalore. This was her payback for hiring uneducated employees. After they joined a communist labor union, she retaliated by automating the plant. The crowd outside burned her in effigy. "I didn't think they'd hurt a woman," she says. But her detractors have certainly tried to hold her back, making it about as tough as possible for a woman to find her way. THE MANTRA: She is quoted as saying, Success is about pursuing a vision with a sense of purpose and a spirit of challenge. There are no short cuts to success and there is no substitute for hard work. I also believe success is about doing things in a differentiated way - dare to be different so that you stand out. Biocon's byline is The difference lies in our DNA and we all believe in it. We don't imitate other companies but have charted our own business destiny. [2] THE ACHIEVEMENTS: Still, over the last two decades Mazumdar-Shaw, now 51, has turned a small enzyme manufacturer into one of India's premier tech companies. It netted $30.5 million on revenue of $122 million for the fiscal year ended Mar. 31.

Her 40 per cent stake in the company is worth $480 million, making her the richest woman in India. The daughter of a brewmaster and a stay-at-home mom, MazumdarShaw grew up in a progressive, middle-clbutt family, which encouraged her to pursue an education instead of an arranged marriage. AWARDS AND RECOGNITION
Over the years, under stewardship of Kiran, Bicon grew exponentially and twenty five years later, it has become only the second Indian company to breach the $ 1billion market cap mark on the first day of its listing. Ms. Kiran Mazumdar Shaw emerged as the wealthiest woman in India and she was described as "India's Biotech Queen" by The Economist while The New York Times called her "India's mother of invention'.

Her pioneering work in the sector has earned her several awards, including the prestigious Padma Shri (1989) and the Padma Bhushan (2005) from the government of India.She was recently named among TIME magazines 100 most influential people in the world. She is also on the Forbes list of the worlds 100 most powerful women, and the Financial Times top 50 women in business list. Ms. Shaw is the recipient of several prestigious awards including the Nikkei Asia Prize, 2009 for Regional Growth,[ref 19] Express Pharmaceutical Leadership Summit Award 2009 for Dynamic Entrepreneur, the Economic Times Businesswoman of the Year, the VeuveClicquot Initiative For Economic Development For Asia, Ernst & Youngs Entrepreneur of the Year Award for Life Sciences & Healthcare, Technology Pioneer recognition by World Economic Forum and The Indian Chamber of Commerce Lifetime Achievement Award. She has received two Indian national awards Padma Shri (1989) and Padma Bhushan (2005) for her pioneering efforts in Industrial Biotechnology. OTHER ACTIVITIES: A pioneer of the Indian biotech sector, Ms Shaw wants to create a global leadership profile for Indias biotech industry. Hence, she engages with the government to shape policies for the sector. Her determination to create a research ethos in India has seen her getting involved with academia.[ref 18] Ms Shaw chairs Karnatakas Vision Group on Biotechnology and also served on the Board of Science Foundation, Ireland. She serves on the Advisory Council of the Governments Department of Biotechnology and is part of the Prime Ministers Council on Trade & Industry in India and the US-India CEO Forum. She serves as Member, Governing Body and General Body of the Indian Pharmacopoeia Commission, an Autonomous Body of the Government of India. She is a founder member of the Society for the formation of Institute for Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine. She has been nominated as Member of the Board of Trade, Directorate General of Foreign Trade, Ministry of Commerce & Industry. Active on the corporate social responsibility front, Ms. Shaw set up the Biocon Foundation in 2004. Recently, she contributed Rs 40 crore to help establish the presently 500-bed Mazumdar-Shaw Cancer Center in Bangalore.[ref 20] In an interview, she stated:

The way I have looked at it is that business is very mercenary and youve got to balance it with some missionary aspect. To me corporate social responsibility is getting that balance right that you got to make sure that you invest in the community that supports your business. [ref 21] Apart from her interested in the civic well-being of Bangalore, she is an avid art collector. She is married to John Shaw who headed leading textiles MNC Madura Coats from 1991-1998 as Chairman and Managing Director

BIOCON: Back in Bangalore in 1978 she started Biocon with Rs. 10,000 as the initial capital, failing to find any financial institution to back her.[ref 4] She began operations out of the garage of a rented house with two employees. She faced several hurdles the company was operating in an environment with sub-optimal infrastructure and personally, she had credibility issues to overcome: she was a 25-year-old first-generation woman entrepreneur without business experience. There was the risk of the business of biotechnology itself an unknown business in 1978. Biocons first product to go to market was peptinpapain, an enzyme found in papaya which is used to prevent beer from turning hazy.[ref 5] Until 1983, the company blended enzymes and supplied them to brewing, textiles, biofuels, animal feed and other such industries across the world. In the mid-1980s with a loan of US $250,000 from ICICI Bank, Biocon was able to build a solid-state fermentation plant which helped in the growth of its R&D. In 1989, the Irish Biocon was acquired by Unilever. In the mid-1990s, Kiran MazumdarShaw decided to focus on biopharmaceuticals rather than enzymes. But Unilever, a major shareholder, did not want to be in the biopharmaceuticals business. At that time, John Shaw, the Scotsman whom Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw had married in 1998, used his savings to reclaim the entire Biocon stake from Unilever.[ref 6] Deciding to follow an aggressive growth chart, Biocon soon ventured into the lucrative biopharmaceutical segment. Foreseeing a great opportunity when branded drugs went off patent, they began to develop lovastatin, a cholesterol-lowering drug whose patent expired in 2001. Biocon eventually began making other forms of statins. The companys revenue went up from Rs. 70 crore in 1998, to Rs. 500 crore in 2004 when it went public.
[ref 7]

In 2007, Biocon made a strategic decision to divest its historic enzymes business to Novozymes A/S of Denmark. Today, Biocon has evolved from an enzyme company to a fully integrated biopharmaceutical company. It now focuses its activities on its bio-

pharma business verticals that include APIs, biologicals and proprietary molecules both commercialized and under development.[ref 8] It is the first company globally to manufacture human insulin, Insugen using a Pichia expression system. In 2006, Biocon launched BIOMAb EGFR [ref 9] the first indigenously developed humanized monoclonal antibody for head-and-neck cancer. Biocons milestone events in each year are as follows [ref 10]:

November 29, 1978 - Biocon India is incorporated as a joint venture between Biocon Biochemicals Ltd. of Ireland and Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw. 1979 - Becomes the first Indian company to manufacture and export enzymes to USA and Europe. 1989 - Unilever plc. acquires Biocon Biochemicals Ltd. in Ireland and merges it with its subsidiary, Quest International; Biocon receives US funding for proprietary technologies. 1990 - Scales up its in-house research program, based on a proprietary solid substrate fermentation technology, from pilot to plant level. 1993 - Biocon's R&D and manufacturing facilities receive ISO 9001 certification from RWTUV, Germany. 1994 - Establishes Syngene International Pvt. Ltd. as a Custom Research Company (CRC). 1996 - The commercial success of Biocon's proprietary fermentation plant leads to a 3-fold expansion; enters biopharmaceuticals and statins. 1997 - Spearheads initiatives in human healthcare through a dedicated manufacturing facility. 1998 - Unilever agrees to sell its shareholding in Biocon to the Indian promoters. Biocon becomes an independent entity 2000 - Commissions its first fully automated submerged fermentation plant to produce specialty pharmaceuticals; establishes Clinigene, India's first Clinical Research Organisation (CRO). 2001 - Becomes the first Indian company to be approved by US FDA for the manufacture of lovastatin; PlaFractorTM is granted a US 2001 and world-wide patent. 2002 - Clinigene's clinical laboratory receives CAP accreditation. 2003 Biocon becomes the first company worldwide to develop human insulin on a Pichia expression system. 2004 Day 1 on the bourses closes with a market value of $1.11 billion, making Biocon only the second Indian company to cross the $1 billion mark on the first day of listing; Syngene establishes new research centre; Biocon launches INSUGEN; Biocon partners with Vaccinex to discover and co-develop at least four therapeutic antibody products. 2005 - Signs a commercial agreement for supply of insulin API to Asia, Africa and the Middle East. 2006 - Inaugurates Biocon Biopharmaceuticals, India's largest multi-product Biologics facility at Biocon Park; Inaugurates Biocon Park, India's largest

integrated biotechnology hub; Licensing agreement with Bayer HealthCare (BHC) for the exclusive marketing and trademark rights for INSUGEN for the Chinese market; 2007 - Biocon and Neopharma sign an MOU to establish a JV to manufacture and market a range of biopharmaceuticals for the GCC countries; Grants exclusive license to Ferozsons Laboratories Limited for marketing BIOMAb EGFR 2008 - Biocon acquires a 70% stake in German pharmaceutical company, AxiCorp GmbH for a consideration of 30 Million; Launches a Safety Device in the form of pre-filled syringes for two of its life saving products, GCSF and EPO in collaboration with Safety Syringes Inc.; Biocon ranked among the top 20 global biotechnology companies (Med Ad News); Biocon is the 7th largest biotech employer in the world (Med Ad News); NeoBiocon and Abraxis Bioscience launch Abraxane in The UAE. 2009 - Syngene partners with Sapient Discovery to expand integrated drug discovery offerings. Biocon inks partnership with ISB to launch the Biocon Cell for Innovation Management;

Affordable Healthcare
Biocon believes that affordable innovation is critical to meeting the healthcare needs of the world.[ref 10] The global healthcare industry is facing an affordability and accessibility crisis. In the face of the drying drug pipeline and declining research productivity and costly nature of drug discovery,[ref 22] India offers a huge cost advantage pharmaceutical research can be carried out at roughly one-fourth the cost in the US. Moreover, the country has a large, qualified English-speaking workforce, a network of research laboratories and traditional pharmaceutical capabilities. These factors combine to endow new drug discovery and development in India with high capital efficiency. Biocon has made four paradigm-changing shifts

Reduce the risk and cost of drug development by experimenting with new risksharing models such as co-development of molecules and offshoring development to contract research organizations and conducting clinical trials in lower-cost locations. Biocons Syngene and Clinigene aim to offer a huge range of costcompetitive, quality research to partners across the world.[ref 1] Expand into emerging markets not only for their extensive market but also to develop new products and establish manufacturing, R&D and other facilities. Biocon has partnered with the Centre for Molecular Immunology (CIM) in Cuba to develop and commercialize a monoclonal antibody for the treatment of headand-neck cancers in India. Biocon has forged marketing tie-ups in emerging markets like Latin America, Mexico, Middle East, North Africa, Asia, China, and Turkey with strong regional players.[ref 1]

Acquire advanced R&D assets through mergers, alliances, and licensing deals to refresh the product pipeline, gain a strategic time-to-market edge, and ensure a competitive advantage. Biocon has partnered with Mylan to jointly develop biosimilars, with Amylin for a novel anti-diabetic hybrid peptide, and with Johns Hopkins start-up, IatriCa [ref 24] for a novel therapeutic cancer vaccine. It has also developed collaborations with several highly innovative US biotech companies with unique platform technologies that did not have the capabilities to take their innovations to the market. Diversify its portfolio by choosing products with shorter regulatory timelines like diagnostics, devices, new drug delivery systems, and vaccines, and turning to generics and biosimilars. Biocon started with generics and statins and moved to recombinant proteins like insulin and insulin analogs and then worked on complex biosimilar monoclonal antibodies. Two novel biologics oral insulin and anti-CD6 are in late-stage clinical trials. Biocons strategy is to maximize development in India to take advantage of the lower R&D costs and faster clinical development timelines.

Awards and Achievements

Biocon has the following awards and achievements to its credit,[ref 1][ref 10]: 2010: Bio-Excellence Award for Outstanding Achievement in the Healthcare Sector at Bangalore Bio 2009: - Among Top 20 Indian companies in Forbes Best Under A Billion list - Bio-Excellence Award for Outstanding Achievement in the Healthcare Sector at Bangalore Bio - Bio-Excellence Award for outstanding achievement in the Biotech Service Sector at Bangalore Bio for Syngene IDMA Best Patent of the year award - BIOMAb EGFR voted Bio-Spectrum Asia-Pacific Product of the year, 2008 - BioSingapore Asia Pacific Biotechnology Award for Best Listed Company 2008: - Ranked among the top 20 global biotechnology companies (Source: Med Ad News, June 2008) - 7th largest biotech employer in the world (Source: Med Ad News, June 2008) 2007: BioServices Company of the Year for Syngene, BIOMAb EGFR wins Product of the Year, BioSpectrum Awards 2006: Best IT User Award in the Pharmaceutical Sector, NASSCOM

2004: - India's first and No. 1 biotech company with a global ranking of 16 (Source: Biospectrum, July 2004) - India's top 5 Life Sciences companies (at close of trade as on July 30, 2004) - Best Reinvention of HR Function Award, Indira Group, Mumbai - Best Employer of India Award, Hewitt 2003: - Bio-Business Award for bio-entrepreneurship, Rabo India - Express Pharma Pulse Award for excellence in the pharmaceutical industry 2001: - Biotech Product, Process Development and Commercialisation Award, Department of Biotechnology, Ministry of Science and Technology, Government of India 2000: - Technology Pioneer Recognition, World Economic Forum 1985: - Export Performance Award, Karnataka State Financial Corporation (KSFC) - National Award for Best Small Industry, Government of India Firsts Set up in 1978, Biocon is India's first biotech company

First Indian biotech company to receive US funding for proprietary technologies (1989) Sets up India's first clinical research organization, Clinigene (2000) First Indian company to be approved by US FDA for the manufacture of lovastatin, a cholesterol-lowering molecule (2001) First company worldwide to develop human insulin on a Pichia expression system (2003) Biocon enters the stock market with its IPO and becomes only the second Indian company to cross the $1-billion mark on the day of listing (2004) Launches Indias first cancer drug, BIOMAb EGFR (2006) First Indian company to manufacture and export enzymes to USA and Europe Indias largest producer and exporter of enzymes Releases countrys first 24-hour diabetes drug, Glargine (2009) First biotech company to receive ISO 9001 certification in India Syngene is countrys first custom research company in drug discovery

Nine out of top 30 most influential people of all time have 9 women as its member.