A Leader With Grit And Grace
In 1996, Suchitra Ella co-founded Bharat Biotech with her husband Krishna Ella. In the year 1995-96 she proposed the idea of returning to India to pursue the dream of entrepreneurship to her husband. Both of them quit their promising and growing careers in the US to relocate along with their two young children.
Bharat Biotech has been driven to solve public health problems for the country first. In the war against SARS COV2, the company did not only develop a new, safe, and effective vaccine within twelve months but also supplied more than 300 million doses of Covaxin, India’s first indigenous vaccine to India and under Vaccine Maithree.
Unmatchable Success Marks
Some of the biggest accomplishments of the company include product and clinical development competencies for vaccines such as Rotavirus, Typhoid TCV, JE, Covid-19, Zika, Chikungunya, among many in its portfolio.
Under Ella’s instrumental leadership, Bharat Biotech has established an excellent track record of innovation with more than 145 global patents, a wide product portfolio of more than 16 vaccines, four bio-therapeutics, registrations in more than 120 countries and WHO pre-qualifications. Bharat is proficient in conducting extensive multi-centre clinical trials and has completed more than 75 trials enrolling more than 300,000 participants globally.
Entrepreneurial journey
Ella feels turning into an entrepreneur was a programme designed for her, as it perfectly complemented her risk-taking nature, out of box thinking, adapting to changes, creating new pathways and solving problems. It was a life-changing decision she took in the mid-90s to relocate to India. I left a successful career in the US, a huge risk without any guarantees, co-founded a startup biotech company based on research, scientific skillset, technology, innovation and people as our core strengths.
Multifaceted Personality
With experience in customer operations, finance, marketing and business development, Ella is a strong pillar of support and guidance at Bharat, overseeing a wide range of operations in the company. Ella is also the Chairperson of CII Indian Women Network. She serves on the Boards of ISB Well Wisher’s Trust and United Way Hyderabad-an International Charity Partner focused on social empowerment in local communities with focus on livelihoods, health and education. She was a former Board member of TTD. Ella strongly believes in corporate citizenship and social responsibility.
Ella holds a BA in Economics and Social Sciences from the University of Madras. She followed this up with diploma in business development from UWCU-Madison, diploma in real estate management from University of South Carolina and post-graduate diploma in patent law from NALSAR—Hyderabad.
Progressive Mindset: Then and Now
Returning to India she crossed over decades of grassroots experience by spearheading many operational and commercial areas in the company such as project planning, administration and HR, finance and accounts, purchase, corporate communication, corporate social responsibility, corporate governance at the Board level, and proudly calls herself the heart of the organisation.
Bharat Biotech’s Ella relentlessly continues to adapt, innovate and improvise to match the needs of their customers. She has been recently awarded the Padma Bhushan for their exemplary contribution to medicine.
Advice to budding entrepreneurs, especially women
Ella says let us aspire to celebrate every woman’s accomplishment. We need to create a varied, equal, and inclusive world without bias. Let us create a world, where diversity is revered and celebrated. We also need to re-orient our view of how we view ourselves now and in the future. Enabling women and young girls is essential to empower their lives, make their own decisions, and achieve holistic growth success in their chosen professions.
