Meet man who failed in class 12 but built Rs 130000 crore firm, now one of Indian richest scientists, net worth is...

Murali Divi, founder of Divi's Labs is one of the top three manufacturers of active pharmaceutical ingredients (API) and it has a market capitalisation of nearly Rs 1.3 lakh crore (over $17 billion).

Murali Divi hails from a small town in Andhra Pradesh and his father was a government employee. There was a time when Murali Divi’s father used to run his family on a monthly pension of Rs 10,000.

Murali Divi studied to become a chemist just like his elder brothers but he decided to move to the US in 1976 and started his career as a pharmacist. Divi left for the US when he was just 25 years old and only had Rs 500 in hand, as reported by Forbes India. He earned around $65000 a year and worked with many companies. His career started at Warners Hindustan Company and received Rs 250. However, he decided to come back to India with USD 40,000 but no future plans. 

Divi joined hands with Kallam Anji Reddy in 1984 to build Cheminor, which was merged with Dr. Reddy's Laboratories in 2000. 

After working at Dr Reddy’s Labs for 6 years, Murali Divi launched Divi’s Laboratories in 1990 and started developing commercial processes for the manufacturing of APIs and intermediates. In 1995, Murali Divi set up its first Manufacturing facility at Choutuppal, Telangana. In 2002, he launched the company’s second manufacturing utility near Visakhapatnam. Hyderabad-based Divi’s Laboratories reported revenue of Rs 88 billion in March 2022.

Murali Divi studied PUC in Machilipatnam and then went to MIT, Manipal Academy of Higher Education for his graduation. Murali Divi completed a Bachelor of Pharmacy course at the College of Pharmaceutical Sciences.