Ajay Piramal (born 3 August 1955) is an Indian industrialist and the chairman of the Piramal Group, which has interests in pharmaceuticals, financial services and property. He is regarded as one of India’s shrewdest dealmakers: he built a drug company through acquisitions and sold its Indian business to Abbott Laboratories in 2010 for about 3.7 billion dollars, then moved into lending and bought the bankrupt housing financier DHFL.
Quick Facts
| Full name | Ajay Gopikisan Piramal |
| Born | 3 August 1955, Bombay (now Mumbai), India |
| Age | 71 |
| Occupation | Industrialist |
| Post | Chairman, Piramal Group |
| Education | Jai Hind College, Mumbai (B.Sc.); Jamnalal Bajaj Institute of Management Studies (MMS); Harvard Business School (Advanced Management Program) |
| Spouse | Dr Swati Piramal |
| Children | 2 (Nandini and Anand) |
Early Life
Piramal belongs to a Marwari family from Bagar in Rajasthan whose textile business in Mumbai went back to his grandfather, Piramal Chaturbhuj. He joined it at 22. His father died suddenly in 1979, the family business was divided, a long strike closed Mumbai’s mills, and in 1984 his elder brother died of cancer, leaving him in charge at 29.
Career
In 1988 he bought Nicholas Laboratories, a small Australian-owned drug maker ranked forty-eighth in India, although he knew nothing of the industry. Over two decades he bought the Indian businesses of Roche, Boehringer Mannheim, Rhône-Poulenc and others and made Nicholas Piramal one of the five largest drug companies in the country.
In May 2010 he sold the domestic formulations business to Abbott for about 3.7 billion dollars, roughly nine times its sales, a price that astonished the industry. He kept the contract manufacturing, critical care and consumer products businesses, which now form Piramal Pharma.
He bought about 11 per cent of Vodafone’s Indian arm in 2011–12 and sold it back two years later at a large profit, and took stakes in the Shriram group. Piramal’s lending business grew quickly in real estate finance and suffered when that market froze in 2018. In 2021 the group won the insolvency auction for Dewan Housing Finance for about 34,000 crore rupees, giving it a large retail home-loan business.
He has been a director of Tata Sons since 2016 and has chaired government committees and the board of IIT Indore.
Personal Life
His wife, Swati Piramal, a doctor, is vice-chairperson of the group. Their daughter, Nandini, runs Piramal Pharma, and their son, Anand, who leads the financial and property businesses, married Isha Ambani, daughter of Mukesh Ambani, in December 2018. The Piramal Foundation works on school leadership, public health and drinking water.
Frequently Asked Questions
When and where was Ajay Piramal born?
Ajay Piramal was born on 3 August 1955 in Bombay (now Mumbai), India and is 71 years old.
What is Ajay Piramal’s occupation?
Occupation: Industrialist.
Featured image: Ajay Piramal, chairman of the Piramal Group, at the Horasis India Meeting, Liverpool, June 2014. Photo by Horasis, licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
