Tamal Raha,Founder

Every start-up has a story to tell. It was in Madrid when the first thought of starting a differentiating business occurred to Tamal Raha. Tamal who was living in Madrid at that time, initially with few of his friends thought to start with big data analytics or food kitchen for that matter. Eventually, he realized he required to be more concrete with his decisions rather than just fiddling around with the ideas. “Deep inside, I always felt that there is a need for thinking differently when it comes to high-cost drug development. Everybody talks about accessibility and affordability and do there bit, but I found that the process of thinking is incomplete because there is a delivery pressure for MNCs. We asked a simple question, Can you develop a world-class drug,without cutting corners,yet be pragmatic in your development/ regulatory approach so that you don’t pass on the drug development cost to patients?,” Tamal explicates.

In 2014,he relocated to India–as an employee of an Indian MNCs in

Pharmaceutical space. By 2016,he firmed up his mind to quit his job to begin thejourney of entrepreneurship. Sadly, the management was not in favour of this. In early 2017, co-incidentally they decided to wrap up the business and Tamal was offered to move to a corporate role. “I felt this is the opportunity that I was looking for a few years and try something different based on what I know that I know. Few of my ex -team members decided to join me. My ex-employer agreed for the separation but they were the first to hand off the first contract to my organization within 15 days of separation. That was the start of Integrated Biopharma and Pharma Solution(IBPS),”he informs.

"Besides India, IBPS is working clients in the US, Central and Eastern Europe, China, Latin America, MENA region"

Like any start-ups, the initial days were tough in terms of meeting the expectations of the team, the clients and acquiring big projects. IBPS consulting began with small projects. Soon, the quality of its services helped it to get hold of clients in India – some of which were the leaders in Pharma and Biopharma space. There were also clients from China, Europe, and the USA. “We have strategic partners in India, Taiwan, South Africa, ANZ region, EU, and North America. Now, it’s difficult to ignore us in this space though we are young,” he mentions.

What makes IBPS stand out in the crowd is that it treats every product, every client uniquely and analyzes the product-client combination and their needs and tries to provide a pragmatic solution rather following traditional approaches. Tamal says, “It’s all about asking the right question at each stage of drug development and define what claim we are going to make and how we can substantiate the claims with scientific evidence. Because we believe in science, our conviction is higher.”

The Road Ahead
With a strong team of eight, IBPS within a short period of time has created its footprints all over India and working with almost all major Pharma MNCs, mid and small size enterprises.“Besides India, we are working for clients in the US, Central and Eastern Europe, China, Latin America, MENA region,” he says.

The company’s primary objective is to create a bigger team in Goa that continues providing the platform for the students who are graduating from local institutes.“In mid to long term,we’ll be looking for certain asset development on our own. But that is investment intensive. We are already in the discussion with few leading institutes in India and also collaborators outside India,” he concludes.