Q1. Could you start by giving us a brief overview of your professional background, particularly focusing on your expertise in the industry?

A business professional with over 15 years of diverse experience in the Life Science industry, specializing in Account Management, Sales & Marketing, Product & Pipeline Management, and Manufacturing sciences. Have hands-on experience in microbial fermentation and mammalian cell culture-based biopharmaceutical manufacturing processes. I have successfully managed a comprehensive portfolio of process chemicals, raw materials, consumables, and contractual services supporting R&D and manufacturing across small and large molecule platforms.

Q2. Which emerging markets or subregions within APAC offer the highest upside potential for early-stage investments, and what factors make them attractive compared to more developed hubs?

India, Indonesia, Vietnam, Taiwan, Philippines are some of the hot segments in the CRO/CDMO space.

Some of the main factors are:

• Cost advantage
• Support from the government towards establishing these industries by making an industry friendly policy
• Diverse scalability options
• End-to end service offerings

Q3. How are leading CDMO/CROs differentiating themselves in biologics and specialty outsourcing across APAC and the Middle East in 2025, and which service segments are scaling fastest?

Focusing on niche segments like mRNA-based therapies, Cell and gene therapy, ADCs

End-to end platforms and service offerings which reduces client dependancy on other partners and project timelines

Bringing in new technologies and their adoption as well - like process automation, single-use, continuous manufacturing

And some of the service segments which are scaling fast are Cell and Gene therapy, viral vector and plasmid manufacturing, which usually support vaccines majorly, High potent API (HPAPI), Drug repurposing, Fill - Finish (specialty formulation and lyophilization).

Q4. What technology innovations have seen the highest adoption rates in APAC’s biologics outsourcing landscape, and how are they impacting operational efficiency and client retention?

One of the biggest technology innovations that has been adopted in recent times at a large scale is Single Use systems, and this has been widely accepted for Upstream and downstream processes both. Like bioreactors, storage bags for downstream processing and fill-finish too. This has brought down the cross-contamination and a drastic reduction in process utilities, too.

And another which I can think of is process automation - this has also been a game-changer for the industries. This has minimized the manual human error, ensured more batch-to-batch consistency, and faster turnaround time.

Q5. What are the biggest shifts in customer demand for biologics, and which signals should investors monitor to identify breakout growth segments or saturation risks in APAC and the Middle East?

Currently, I believe one of the main shifts is because of the surge in demand for biosimilars, and secondly the recent shift towards cell and gene therapy has also contributed to a change in focus areas.

Some areas which an investor should monitor can be - closely monitoring regulatory landscapes and approvals, and this also includes the government programs/initiatives, management of talent pool, and hiring signals.

Q6. What recent M&A activities have reshaped the competitive landscape for CDMOs/CROs in APAC, and how are key players leveraging these transactions to enhance market share and capabilities?

I have personally observed a trend among major players in Asia acquiring sites in the Americas and Europe. This not only gives them a global footprint but also helps them in leveraging those markets and also mitigating the risk.

Syngene International has acquired Emergent's Baltimore facility for their biologic’s operations. Enzene Biosciences has also acquired one site in New Jersey, Thermo Fisher and Lonza partnerships, and Wuxi Biologics has agreed to sell its drug product plant in Leverkusen (Germany) to Terumo.

Q7. If you were an investor looking at companies within the space, what critical question would you pose to their senior management?

Some of those will be around:

• Capacity utilization and discipline
• Which segments/modalities are your core to your next 5 years?
• Data integrity and process regulations
• Track record on timely completion/delivery of the projects
• How the capex and revenue allocations are managed