A senior company official said the Mulund unit would offer to undertake lead discovery work for drug firms for a fee, as part of an effort to make it a `business-driven' R&D facility. The Hoechst group could probably look at the Mulund unit as an outsourcing base for research.

The company has constituted a scientific advisory board, headed by Unilever research head Ashok Ganguly, to assist the group in its R&D effort. Other key members on this board include: Minoo Dastoor manager (environmental & biomedical technology programme) Jet PropulsionLaboratories NASA USA, Professor Gangadharam TB specialist at the University of Illinois Chicago, and specialists like BK Goyal and VN Archarya. The Mulund unit would continue to be headed by Bansi Lal under the overall leadership of chief scientific officer of the Piramal group Swati Piramal.

Explaining the rationale for the acquisition, the official said that while the Mulund unit's efforts were concentrated on discovery research and organic synthesis, it did not have a pilot plant nor a research-based formulation capability. "Nicolas already has a pilot facility at Thane, formulation capability at Deonar and clinical development facilities at Parel. So the acquisition fits in quite well and would actually give the company a jump start on the R&D front," the official said.

Besides, Nicholas had also commenced research in the area of natural products and the acquisition is expected to boost this effort significantly. The Hoechst Centre for Basic Research in Mulund functioned as the natural productscentre within the group's global-research umbrella. The unit is credited with having isolated 230 compounds of interest from micro-organisms and plant material.

The official said that all projects currently in progress would continue and the patent rights to these products would lie with Hoechst. The patent rights to newly-developed products would accrue to Nicholas Piramal. Key discoveries at Mulund including Flavopirdol, a synthetic derivative based on a natural compound (currently in phase three trials), and Rohitukine, an anti-cancer compound, have already been patented by the Hoechst group. The Mulund unit had also paved the way for the discovery of a cardiotonic NKH 477 currently being developed by Nippon Kayaku in Japan in coordination with the Indian centre. The Piramals are expected to facilitate the continuation of this project. Nicholas Piramal is also working on newer research alliances with the Massachusetts University of Technology and Harvard University. The latter will essentially entail `anexchange of brain power.'

The Mulund research centre already has alliances with scientists at the National Institute of Immunology, Delhi and the University Department of Chemical Technology in Mumbai.