Executive Chairperson, Biocon
Biocon Chairperson Kiran Mazumdar Shaw on 2021 Union Budget | EXCLUSIVE
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman delivered the 2021 Union Budget today. FM announced that the Centre has focused and decided to spend more on the healthcare sector, this keeping in mind the COVID-19 pandemic outbreak and its effect on the healthcare system.
To discuss more on the 2021 budget and its key takeaways we have Biocon Chairperson Kiran Mazumdar Shaw on Mirror Now. She says that the ‘2021 Budget focussed on growth, investment and jobs. There were no negative surprises; was particularly happy with the focus on Health care. However, the big challenge is how quickly we can get the fi...
About Kiran Mazumdar-shaw
Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw, Executive Chairperson of Biocon, announced in May 2026 that her niece, Claire Mazumdar, will succeed her as the company's leader. Mazumdar-Shaw stated that she had long planned to groom Claire for the role and decided the time had come to announce it because Claire had "earned her stripes." She cited Claire's work building Biocara Therapeutics, including raising capital, obtaining a breakthrough designation for a bispecific antibody, and listing the company on Nasdaq in 2024 as a billion-dollar company. Mazumdar-Shaw said the transition will be gradual, with Claire expected to take over in five years, and that she herself plans to step back into a guiding role rather than an active one. She also stated that family will remain at the board level while professional management drives day-to-day operations. On the company's financial performance, Mazumdar-Shaw reported that Biocon closed FY26 on a strong note, with Q4 operating revenue at Rs. 4,517 crore, up 10% year-on-year after adjustments. She said the company is now operating as "one unified biopharma entity" with a stronger balance sheet and that the heavy capital investment phase is behind them, with the focus now on improving utilization, expanding margins, and driving return on capital employed. Mazumdar-Shaw described the outlook as "very bullish," citing new product launches, a growing pipeline, and opportunities in biosimilars and GLP-1 therapies. She also noted that the FDA's decision to waive phase three clinical trials for certain biosimilars has reduced development costs by 50% and accelerated product timelines by three to four years. Separately, Mazumdar-Shaw hosted the 25th annual St. Patrick's Day celebration in Bengaluru in her capacity as Honorary Consul General of Ireland, alongside Ireland's Ambassador to India, Kevin Kelly.
Transcript (9 segments)
✨ AI-enhanced transcript with speaker attribution
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Interviewer0:00
Thanks for staying on. We're going straight across. We're connected with Mrs. Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw, Biocon Chief, with us. Appreciate you, ma'am, being with us. Good evening. Your first reaction along the lines of your expectations of what you've heard in the Union Budget today?
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Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw0:14
Well, my first takeaways from the budget were that it was focused on growth, investment, and jobs, and I think that is a very good focus for a post-pandemic budget. I think there were no negative surprises, so that sort of called up investor and market sentiments. And I was particularly impressed with the focus on healthcare, which is but natural after the pandemic. And I think what is important for us to understand is that the investment focus on infrastructure projects, mega projects, and healthcare to create jobs and to bring back the lost jobs into the economy is extremely urgent. The big challenge we have is how quickly can we get the financial model working, because I'm very, you know, obviously supportive of the government in its divestments, its monetization and privatization plans, but it's always a worry that it may not happen fast enough. So I think the focus has to be on how quickly we can get the funding organized, because we really need to get into this investment more very, very rapidly. The other point that I wanted to make was that, you know, private sector has to be a very integral part of this budgetary allocation. For instance, research and innovation, there were huge, you know, statements made on how much they were going to invest in the public sector research ecosystem, but I would like to see a strong industry-academia focus in this allocation. So, you know, in everything we do, even whether it's divestment and the monetization, I think private sector has to play a very important role. And unless private sector is taken as a close partner in all these measures, you know, we will find it very difficult to implement in time.
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Interviewer2:26
Right. This is Kiran. This was of course very, very specifically also asked to the Finance Minister with respect to the point you raised in the first press conference that she just done earlier this afternoon on ensuring that there is jobs creation. She stated that this is a cycle which will eventually fall into place and come into place. This is a budget that has incentivized growth, this is a budget that is pending for growth, and that would eventually happen. That shouldn't be a concern being raised for immediate job creation. It's a cycle and let's wait for the cycle to play out.
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Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw3:06
Well, you know, unfortunately we have seen huge job losses, and even though it's a cycle, and I agree with the Finance Minister that it is a cycle, we don't have the luxury of time to wait for that cycle to happen. So we have to almost get started, and that's where I think we need to focus a bit. I think the healthcare sector is a huge opportunity for us to create an immediate job opportunity for millions of jobs, because, you know, the allied workforce in healthcare is huge, whether it is ASHA workers, anganwadi workers, nurses, paramedics. You can see that this pandemic actually exposed the vulnerability that we have in delivering healthcare services and healthcare in general. And I think if this is an area we can really focus on, we can create large number of jobs in this sector. I think infrastructure projects is another big job creating sector, and that's why I want these projects to take off as soon as possible. So we do need to focus on how we unleash and unlock value from many of the PSU divestment or monetization or privatization measures that we are planning to take. So I don't think we have the luxury of time to wait for the job cycle to start working. So we need to give it a kickstart.
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Interviewer4:39
Okay. Yes, also with respect to allocation here that's coming for the health budget, of course, each time the expectation is more that there should be more, but this is the maximum in decades that we've ever seen, a record 137% increase here in allocation. In your understanding, in your calculation here, as far as within that allocation for the health budget that is coming for COVID vaccine expenditure, it's a one-time expenditure. The criticism now that is coming in that it is, of course, 35,000 crore rupees here for COVID vaccine, but it is a one-time expenditure and this is going to be falling short as well.
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Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw5:22
Well, the way I look at it is that, look, if we can spend 35,000 crores for vaccines this year, then we should be able to spend 35,000 crores every year for our disease burden, which is a health emergency. You know, if you think about it, we cannot ignore any more the communicable and non-communicable diseases like TB, diabetes, cardiac, cancer. We have to invest in those as well. So I think it's a good thing that we have decided to spend 35,000 crores on vaccines, but I hope the same 35,000 crores can be rolled over in coming years on these areas as well. Secondly, I think we also have a one-time spend on that 64,000 crores on beefing up the primary, secondary, and tertiary infrastructure. I think this is an amount that needs to keep, you know, being spent, especially when we get into the National Digital Health Mission. So I think this extra amount of almost 100,000 crores that we have allocated to healthcare ought to be spent every year because we have to get up to the 2.5% over the next, you know, four or five years. And if we want to get up to 2.5% by 2024, then we've just got to keep this pace of spending going. So I, for one, believe that this is a signal that we can spend this much, and we should spend this much and more in the coming years.
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Interviewer7:04
Right. As an assessment, if you could bring across this assessment from your side very quickly here on, once again, on what has been announced within the health budget here in your view, and what we've had in the past few years for what had been another landmark announcement in terms of Ayushman Bharat, and what we've heard today under PM's Swasthya Bharat, under which these announcements have come in. How do the two pan together with respect to what has worked so far under Ayushman Bharat vis-a-vis what we are expecting to work today in other areas under this new yojana?
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Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw7:43
So I think Ayushman Bharat is a very important and a very great initiative that has been rolled out. I think it has helped a large number of BPL families already, and I think we need to, you know, make sure it's a comprehensive universal healthcare from preventive, promotive, and curative healthcare. So we need to look at all these aspects. Secondly, we need to strengthen primary and secondary healthcare, which is going to be a big focus. So I think the Finance Minister has done well in terms of budgetary allocation for all these areas.
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Interviewer8:32
Chairperson Biocon, Mrs. Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw, appreciate you speaking to us. Your first reaction, your first big takeaway for the Union Budget 2021 that has been announced today. With that, we're slipping into a very tiny breather. Stay on with us here, please.