Abject poverty and a rural background did not dampen his spirit to achieve academic excellence and transform OMICS International – a firm floated by him into a Rs.600 crore-venture in a span of eight to nine years.
Hailing from a low income family from Palakonda area in Srikakulam district of North Andhra Pradesh with an annual income of Rs.20,000, Gedela Srinubabu could complete B. Pharm, M. Tech (Biotechnology) from Andhra University and later post-doctoral degree from Stanford University. He received PhD at the age of 25 years. The turning point in his life was the honour to receive Young Scientist Award in Seoul in 2007 from Human Proteome Organisation in recognition of his research on proteomics and diabetes.
Dr. Srinibabu, who after starting open access journal Proteomics founded OMICS International in 2007 with the amount saved by him from his fellowship. Today, his firm publishes over 700 journals with 50,000 articles annually with 100 plus conferences world-over.
The firm today has offices in India, the United States and Romania. In eight years, he could employ 1,500 mostly locals from life sciences background – 90 per cent of them in Hyderabad office.
“My failure to access advanced journals when I was a student in Visakhapatnam gave me strong will to promote open access journals and organise scientific conferences and symposiums,” he told The Hindu in an interview on Saturday.
Office in Vizag soon
Dr. Srinubabu disclosed that he had acquired two acres of land at Gambheeram, where IIM has been allotted site for its campus. “I want to develop an integrated facility for publication of open access journals and scientific research in Visakhapatnam,” he said. He has also requested the State government to allot a suitable site at Rushikonda to develop another facility. Andhra University and other educational institutes produce a lot of students in life sciences. With little fine-tuning, they could be absorbed to don greater roles to serve the humanity, he pointed out.
My failure to access advanced journals when I was a student in Visakhapatnam gave me strong will to promote open access journals and organise scientific conferences and symposiums
Gedela Srinubabu
OMICS International
