Dilip Shanghvi, the founder of India’s most valuable pharma outfit, Sun Pharma has a net worth of around $7.5 billion. The Government of India awarded him the civilian honor of Padma Shri in 2016.

Early Life

Dilip Shanghvi hails from a Gujarati Kapol Vaishnav family, who was born in the small town of Amreli in Gujarat to Shantilal Shanghvi and Kumud Shanghvi. Shanghvi earned a Bachelor of Commerce degree from the University of Calcutta. He spent his childhood and college life with his parents in the Burrabazar locality of Calcutta. He is an alumnus of J. J. Ajmera High School and Bhawanipur Education Society College, where he did his schooling and graduation, respectively

Sun Pharma

According to Bloomberg billionaire index, Shangvi‘s net worth can buy him 138 million barrels of gold. Sun Pharma which manufactures gynecology and oncology medicines amongst others, is one of India’s most companies with a revenue of $3.6 billion. It has operations across 150 countries and employs over 50,000 people.

Professional Front

In 2015, Shanghvi had briefly outranked Mukesh Ambani to become the country’s richest man. The wealth of Sun Pharma promoters was then at $19 billion.

It was only for a brief moment & Ambani has successfully taken back his title but that doesn’t make Shangvi any less exclusive.

However, over the last four years, Shanghvi lost over 60% of his wealth owing to declining Sun Pharma valuation. Sun Pharma’s market cap declined more than 40% between 2015 and 2018 after the US Food and Drug Administration issued a warning against Sun Pharma’s Halol plant over manufacturing lapses.

According to Forbes, he had a net worth of $16.7 Billion in 2016, which reduced to $7.6 billion in 2019.

Shanghvi took home Re 1 as salary in FY19 from around Rs 3 crore in FY18. This is because he forewent 99 percent of his FY19 salary as India’s largest drug maker optimized operational costs due to pricing pressure and moderating growth in the US.