Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw Receives Coveted ‘Othmer Gold Medal 2014’ from Chemical Heritage Foundation

Bangalore, May 17, 2014 – Biocon Ltd, Asia’s premier biotechnology company, announced today that its Chairperson and Managing Director, Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw, received the ‘Othmer Gold Medal 2014’ on Thursday, May 15, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA.

Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw is the third woman to receive the Othmer Gold Medal and the first Indian to make it to this prestigious group. Nineteen people have been conferred with this honor till date, including Arnold O. Beckman, Carl Djerassi, Mary Lowe Good, Harry B. Gray, Jon M. Huntsman, Kazuo Inamori, Robert S. Langer, P. Roy Vagelos, James D. Watson, George Whitesides and Ahmed Zewail.

Carsten Reinhardt , President & CEO, CHF, handed over the Foundation’s top award to Ms. Mazumdar-Shaw during CHF’s Chemical Heritage Day celebration that culminated with the presentation of the Othmer Gold Medal.

The CHF lauded Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw’s pioneering efforts in biotechnology and for scripting a hugely successful entrepreneurial story by drawing on her knowledge of fermentation science to build Biocon, India’s first biopharma company.

Accepting the award, Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw, CMD – Biocon, said, ” I am deeply grateful to the Chemical Heritage Foundation for awarding me the Othmer Gold Medal 2014. This is an honour akin to being invited to join an extraordinary league of scientists, engineers, entrepreneurs, thought leaders and philanthropists, an emotion that is both proud and humbling at the same time.

As an entrepreneur who is driven by a sense of purpose to make a difference to global healthcare, I take pride in saying that Biocon is contributing to affordable innovation which goes to the core of ensuring a global right to healthcare. In this, we seem to be drawing lessons from Donald Othmer’s practical and low-cost approach to innovation. ”

A pioneer of the biotechnology industry in India, Ms. Mazumdar-Shaw has made her country proud with a globally recognized biopharma enterprise – Biocon. Under her stewardship, Biocon has evolved into India’s largest biopharma company committed to innovation and affordability to deliver world class therapeutics to patients across the globe. CCI Newswire