On a typical rainy day in monsoony Mumbai, the fifth floor in Cipla’s office reflects a quiet calm — unlike the buzz elsewhere in the city, preparing to welcome a World Cup winning cricket team later in the day. The stillness is soon dispelled as Umang Vohra, Cipla’s Managing Director and Global Chief Executive Officer walks into the room for an exhaustive interaction on the drugmaker’s journey, especially in the eight-odd years he’s been at the helm. A brief sporty chat on cricket, chess and even basketball, and the conversation plunges right into the heart of news developments swirling around Cipla, including Vohra’s perspective of where the company is headed.
His task doesn’t get any easier. Earlier this year, the third generation of the Cipla promoter family, Samina Hamied, announced she was stepping down as executive vice-chairperson from March 31, 2024. Samina is the daughter of MK Hamied, brother of Dr YK Hamied. And this set the news-mill churning again.
But Cipla is no stranger to speculations about possible stake-sale by the promoter family. Last year saw several reports, drawing deep concerns from political and health advocacy circles on how a stake-sale might impact Cipla’s legacy as an affordable drugs supplier to patients in India and overseas. The pharma company’s pathbreaking supply of HIV drugs in Africa, at less than a dollar a day in 2001, is still talked about. Cipla doyen Dr YK Hamied, however, told shareholders that the stake-sale reports were “speculative”.
Investing in science
“Cipla works with the heart of a foundation” and perhaps it could have done better on translating its capabilities into value, says Vohra, on the journey as he saw it. Nevertheless, the drugmaker set about its transformation to own its strengths, (becoming a “lung leader” in the respiratory segment) and building on its role as a “crusader in crisis,” he adds. Cipla looked at oncology (cancer therapies) and AMR (antimicrobial resistance) products addressing the growing global concern on overuse of antibiotics, for example, besides charting a course to include emerging therapies and more innovation.
Investing in companies close to the science was one such strategy, says Vohra and “that’s still a work in progress”. Cipla invested in stem cell research (Stempeutics in 2009), but more recently, in Germany’s Ethris GmbH that uses proprietary mRNA technology for drug delivery options.
In fact, the last several months has seen multiple corporate actions from Cipla, including acquiring the distribution and marketing undertakings of Ivia Beaute Pvt Ltd’s (India) cosmetics and personal care business; investing in digi-tech company GoApptiv; shifting its trade generics to Cipla Pharma and Life Sciences and closing down subsidiaries including Uganda’s Cipla Quality Chemical Industries.
Cipla hit multiple milestones including clocking a turnover of ₹25,000 crore (March 2024), its One-India (business) revenue crossing ₹10,000 crore, North America revenue surpassing $900 million and South Africa doing well in the prescription market.
On the innovation train
Looking back to when he joined (2015) as Global Chief Financial Officer, Vohra says, the journey has progressed from “saving the company” to sustaining what was done, to pushing ahead on innovation.
“Cipla will continue to be a very strong partner-of-choice to its patients and customers across our key markets of South Africa, India, the US and other emerging markets,” he says, and continue with complex generic drugs and respiratory products.
The plan now is to up the “innovative revenue” or revenues from innovative products. There’s difficult-to-make products like inhalers (at 28 percent of revenues) and wellness products (at 10 percent); together it means 40 per cent of the company’s revenues come from “fairly protected” sources, he says. The aim is to add a layer of innovative medicines to account for another 15 per cent of revenues — “so at least 70 per cent of the company’s revenue sources are predictable and not uncertain,” explains Vohra.
On Cipla’s radar is neurology (Parkinson’s, Epilepsy and Autism) and obesity — not just weight-loss, but also its impact on heart disease, he explains. Autoimmune disorders, inflammation, cell-and gene therapy are also areas of interest.
Partners and promoters
Cipla has a slew of partnerships with domestic companies like Orchid Pharma and multinationals including Roche, Sanofi, Novartis and Eli Lilly.
Vohra narrates a chat with Dr Hamied to explain how Cipla — once a challenger of these companies’ monopolies — now partners with them. It’s about improving access to the patient, says Vohra, indicating times have changed and companies too are open to alliances to get products to more people.
On the journey this far, Vohra says, “Cipla is now completely professionalised” — a decision taken about 10 years ago when Subhanu Saxena, (former Novartis executive) was brought in at the helm.
“The reality of Cipla as it is today is that the two people who fundamentally groomed the business are today 88 and 84 (years old). They have no intention to sell the business,” he says.
Whatever the future holds, “the face of Cipla has always been the Hamied family... their values will always be central to what we do,” Vohra reiterates, underscoring the legacy of Cipla founder Khwaja Abdul Hamied and subsequent stewardship by sons Dr YK Hamied and MK Hamied.