Selling medicines at a discount of 90%, THIS 21-year-old built a Rs 500 crore company

A 21-year-old has built a company with a net worth of Rs 500 crore just by offering medicines at a much lower price than the market rate. The company now boasts of a chain of franchisees and also has the support of veteran industrialist and former Tata Group chairperson Ratan Tata. When Arjun Deshpande was barely 16, he started a company that offered medicines at a cheaper rate than usually available in the market. At 21, Deshpande is the CEO of Generic Aadhaar which sells generic medicines via its chain of franchisees at 80-90 per cent discounts. The Mumbai-based startup is now worth Rs 500 crores. Christened Generic Aadhaar, his company removed the multiple intermediaries such as marketers, distributors, and stockists, to cut down production and selling costs significantly. For instance, diabetes drug Glimipiride, which normally sells for Rs 110 per strip, is available at a little over Rs 5 through Generic Aadhaar, whereas anti-allergen Levocetrizine, which usually sells for Rs 55, is available for under Rs 6 per strip, according to a CNBCTV18 report. In its early years, Generic Aadhaar expanded rapidly across cities and won Deshpande his first TED talk which soon turned viral and caught Ratan Tata’s attention. Impressed by the company’s innovative model, the industrialist offered to invest in the start-up venture. Since then, Ratan Tata has helped Generic Aadhaar reach the last mile of the country. Now, the startup has 2,000 stores across the country, and employs staff of nearly 10,000 people. In April, Arjun Deshpande was lauded by President Droupadi Murmu for his dedication to making medicines affordable for Indian citizens and acknowledged Generic Aadhaar’s work is contributing to the growth of the economy. She also called Deshpande the “wonder kid of pharma”. The firm is currently working on expanding to Bangladesh, Nepal, Bhutan, Sri Lanka, UAE, and Myanmar— a sizeable section of India’s neighbours. “We will be shortly opening our stores in Dubai, Oman, Cambodia, and Vietnam as well,” Deshpande said earlier. The company is also looking at increasing it stores to 3,000 up by 500 and entering the veterinary space. CEO Arjun Deshpande believes medicines for animals available at low prices would significantly reduce the financial stress of farmers. Generic Aadhaar, recently, opened its first veterinary store in Andhra Pradesh. Read all the Latest News , Trending News , Cricket News , Bollywood News , India News and Entertainment News here. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.