NITI Aayog Names Hyderabad as Key Twin Bioeconomy Hub to Drive Sectoral Growth
The policy think tank NITI Aayog has identified Hyderabad and Bengaluru as India's key twin bioeconomy hubs to drive major growth in the sector. According to the "Roadmap for Building India as a Leading BioEconomy Powerhouse by 2035" report, the country's bioeconomy is projected to grow from $195 billion in 2025 to $1.36 trillion by 2040. Hyderabad, with its established pharmaceutical and biologics clusters, is positioned to capture a significant share of this expansion.
The rapid expansion of the sector is credited to national policies, including production-linked incentives, national biotech parks, and proactive state life-sciences policies. Telangana, alongside Karnataka and Gujarat, has implemented tailored incentives, subsidized land, and single-window facilitation to accelerate the clustering of life-sciences activity.
In Hyderabad, these policy measures have combined with national research institutions, biotech parks, and translational infrastructure to build a dense ecosystem for research and development (R&D) and scale-up manufacturing. This has successfully attracted global firms and capital commitments to the city.
Bioeconomy consultant Ramesh Iyer highlighted that Hyderabad's manufacturing heritage, clinical research depth, and strong talent pipelines give it a distinct edge. To further capitalize on these strengths, Iyer recommended scaling shared biomanufacturing facilities, investing in digital bio-infrastructure like AI design platforms and biosensor-based quality systems, and deploying targeted de-risking finance to attract long-term private capital.
The economic upside for Hyderabad is expected to include higher-value manufacturing, skilled biotechnology employment, and the expansion of ancillary sectors such as cold chain and specialty chemicals. Additionally, rising exports of biologics are projected to bolster the local economy.
NITI Aayog's benchmarking report cited various global pathways, such as the United States' biomanufacturing push and China's plan-led industrial scale-up, to illustrate the potential of the sector. For Telangana, the report emphasized that coordinated state action to build manufacturing-ready infrastructure, skills, and standards will be critical as India transitions from incentives-led growth to large-scale commercial biomanufacturing.
