Dilip Shanghvi: Know the founder of Sun Pharmaceuticals

Shanghvi started by helping his father in his business, which was a wholesale dealership of medicines, mainly generic drugs, in Kolkata. It was during this work that he thought of manufacturing his own drugs instead of selling products made by others. In 1982, Dilip Shanghvi opened his manufacturing unit, with a capital of INR 10,000, named Sun Pharmaceutical Industries to make psychiatric drugs.

Dilip Shanghvi is the founder and Managing director of Sun Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd. (Sun Pharma), the fourth largest specialty generic pharmaceutical company in the world.  As of July 2022, Dilip Shanghvi has $16.3B net worth, according to Forbes.

Shanghvi started by helping his father in his business, which was a wholesale dealership of medicines, mainly generic drugs, in Kolkata. It was during this work that he thought of manufacturing his own drugs instead of selling products made by others. In 1982, Dilip Shanghvi opened his manufacturing unit, with a capital of INR 10,000, named Sun Pharmaceutical Industries to make psychiatric drugs. The unit was located in Vapi in his native state of Gujarat.

Advertisement

However, the business soon picked up, thanks to Shanghvi's acumen and energy, and by 1997, Sun Pharma was even able to acquire Caraco Pharma, an American company. Sun Pharma also acquired Israel's Taro Pharma in 2007. Shanghvi stepped down as chairman and CEO in 2012 and chose Israel Makov, formerly CEO of Teva Pharmaceuticals, as his successor; Shanghvi became managing director.

In April 2014 Sun, Ranbaxy, and Daiichi Sankyo (the majority shareholder in Ranbaxy) agreed that Sun would acquire all outstanding shares of Ranbaxy for $3.2 billion in Sun stock and that Sun would take on $800M in Ranbaxy debt; the deal closed in March 2015 and made Sun the largest drug company in India and fifth largest in the world, and made Daiichi the second-largest shareholder in Sun.

Advertisement

Also read | Ramon Laguarta: Know the new PepsiCo CEO who succeeded Indra Nooyi

Shanghvi is one of the  richest man of India. According to Forbes, as of October 2021, he was the 14th richest person in India.  The Sun Pharma is India’s most valuable listed pharma outfit and gets two third of its $ 4.5 billion annual revenue from overseas markets.

Advertisement

In January 2018, the Indian government appointed Shanghvi to the Reserve Bank of India’s 21- member central board Committee. He is chairman of the board of governors at IIT Bombay. In 2017, Shanghvi was made a trustee of the Rhodes scholarship programme at Oxford University.  He was also honoured with Padma Shri in 2016 by Government of India.

On October 1, 1955, Dilip Shanghvi was born in a small town of Amreli in the Indian state of Gujarat. He comes from a Jain family settled in Kolkata. He Completed his schooling from J. J. Ajmera High School in Kolkata and for his graduation, he went to Bhawanipur Education Society College in Kolkata. Shanghvi earned a Bachelor of Commerce degree from the University of Calcutta. He is married to Vibha Shanghvi and has a Son Aalok and a daughter Vidhi.

Advertisement

Advertisement