(September 21, 2022) As a child, Anuradha Acharya would spend hours in a physics laboratory watching her father, a physics professor, work. In between conducting experiments, he used to encourage his daughter to be inquisitive and constantly seek answers. As a result, Anu’s world revolved mostly around science and technology. Along the journey, and after a little bit of soul-searching, a young Anu realised that entrepreneurship was her true calling. Her decision to give wings to her entrepreneurial journey coincided with the human genome sequencing, that was underway in the year 2000. The entrepreneur was quick to see the potential in the genomics space in the future. This became the foundation of her first start-up Ocimum Bio Solutions.

Entrepreneur Anu Acharya

“What started as a pure bioinformatics company soon became an enterprise with top pharma labs using our ‘RaaS’ ( Research as a service), solutions, genomics database, and diagnostics kits. Ocimum became one of the largest service providers in the genomics space for discovery, development, and diagnostics with three international acquisitions and two fundraisers,” informs Anuradha Acharya, settling down for an exclusive interview with Global Indian.

Seeing the growth of personalised medicine, she launched MapmyGenome — a leading personal genomics company in India — in 2013. The company’s operations are spread across Hyderabad, Delhi, and Bengaluru.

Scaling new heights
She says with the Indian Government launching its first human genome mapping project to develop effective cancer treatments, one can also look forward to technological advancements that enable experts to correct disease-causing sequence anomalies rather than just identifying potential threats and offering alternative solutions

“MapmyGenome is focusing on combining genomics with biochemistry using machine learning. Besides, we plan to scale up our operations across India by setting up genomics centers and through meaningful collaborations with major healthcare institutions and service providers,” informs the recipient of the Astia Life Science Innovators award, 2008, of her plans. Recently, her company started a novel initiative to understand the genetic make-up of people who are above 90 to find what constitutes a healthy, long life.