India has many comparative advantages in terms of knowledge, skills, R&D facilities and costs in the sector. The core competence of Indian biotech industry exists in: handling fermentation-based products, use of plant and animal parts for extracting value added products of high purity, use of cell/microbial culture techniques, plant breeding techniques, Plant cell/tissue culture, etc. India has an edge over other countries to set up viable and competitive biotech enterprises. The growth is expected in the following areas: Agri-Biotech 60%, Diagnostic 25%, Vaccines 15% .

The Indian biotechnology market is expected to grow to US$ 204 million by 2003 and US$ 408 million by 2007. There are enormous business opportunities in the following areas:

	Vaccines: ‘combination’ vaccines, such as DPT with Hepatitis B, Hepatitis A and injectable polio vaccine, besides several veterinary and poultry vaccines.
	Bioactive Therapeutic Proteins: Insulin, Alpha, Interferon, Hepatitis B surface antigen based vaccine, Erythropoietin, Streptokinase, Chymotrypsin, PGF, GCSF, Gm-CSF, Interleukins and others, which is expected to grow to US$200 million in 2005.
	Agriculture sector: Hybrid seeds, including genetically modified seeds, genetically modified crops like corn, cotton, millet, mustard and other nutritionally improved vegetables also provide good potential in the agriculture sector. Further details can be found at http://dbtindia.nic.in