Research Powered by Net

By Ramesh Akkineni
From an article in Economic Times
The axis of scientific research is shifting. It’s moving east. While scientists in America are worried about the erosion of their competitive edge, India is sitting smug. With the second largest pool of English-speaking scientific professionals in the world, Indians are now providing solutions to top global companies from India. What’s more, they are raking in mega bucks too.
From Kolhapur to Warangal, Chandigarh to Hyderabad, scientists from small universities and labs across the country are registering with Internet forums to provide solutions to MNCs like Eli Lilly, P&G , Henkel, Dow AgroSciences, Novartis et al. Many of these solutions are being patented too.

Y Venkateswarlu from the Indian Institute of Chemical Technology (IICT), Hyderabad, recently earned $60,000 for a solution to make natural pesticides for a top American chemical company. ‘‘ Although the solution seeker’s name was not revealed, I believe Dow Chemicals had posted the problem,’’ he says proudly. The solution: a pure compound from organic sulphur, synthesised into a natural pesticide. ‘‘ We collected a green alga from Andamans and I isolated sulphur compounds from it. It was synthesised to create one gram of the pure compound,’’ explains Venkateswarlu.

Like him, many Indian scientists are joining Net forums, where pharma, biotech, FMCG companies anonymously post their scientific problems for solving by outsiders. ‘‘ With India is being discovered as a knowledge producing centre, companies are looking at the highly skilled manpower to partner research ,’’ says Chandra Shekhar of IICT, Hyderabad. No wonder many MNCs are relocating their R&D facilities here.

With companies looking at external resources as complimentary innovation solutions, various platforms are catching up. Inno-Centive is one such a web-based community , matching scientists to relevant R&D challenges of leading companies. ‘‘ It has over 110,000 registered scientists, called solvers, from 175 countries with nearly 40 seeker companies,’’ says Ali Hussein, VP, Global Markets, InnoCentive Inc. The posted problems are available for viewing by scientists and the successful problem solver is rewarded with a cash prize from the seeker company .

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