Welcome back to your The MMS morning habit as usual. The second coming of Aditya Puri may not be as market-defining as his first innings but it’s no less storied. In his 26 years at HDFC Bank, the inveterate banker saw it grow from a startup to India’s largest private sector bank. His sway over the bank was such that when he sold most of his holding in the bank in July 2020, three months before hanging up his boots, the stock suffered a mild panic attack and fell over 3%. With a networth of Rs 1,300 crore ($175 million), Puri ranks among the richest non-promoter Indians. And if you study how he’s invested his time and money in the short post-HDFC span, you’ll see Puri has taken to healthcare like a pro. Most intriguing is Puri’s investment and board positions in Bengaluru-based Strides pharma group. Promoter Arun Kumar is a wealth-creating entrepreneur who starts companies, puts some beef around them, and then sells with aplomb. When I had asked him about his deal-making two years ago, he said, “Every employee comes to the office thinking there’s a deal around the corner.” Did Puri embrace that thinking when he took board positions in the group companies and invested in Kumar’s Stelis Biopharma? How about the encore in API Holdings, the parent company of PharmEasy, the hottest health tech company now decked up for an IPO? Puri invested Rs 30 crore in API just before its valuation began ballooning. What’s more, Puri’s consultancy firm is also serving API. They say one sure-fire way to be successful in India is to know someone who knows someone who knows someone… It’s not the tech but the Indian ‘network effect’. In Puri’s case, think HDFC founding team, think old investors, think family investment firm, think new common investors. In an interview with Reuters, when asked about Stelis, Puri said, “I talked to Arun Kumar who runs it, and it was almost like HDFC Bank all over again.” The goal, Puri indicated, was to list Stelis on the Nasdaq. But healthcare is not banking. In the year ended March 2021, 14-year-old Stelis posted a consolidated revenue of Rs 21.4 crore ($3 million) and loss of Rs 121 crore ($16 million). No worries, there’s API ahead - already valued at more than ~$5 billion by private investors. Intrigued by Puri’s pharma/healthcare run, We tried to connect many dots. And he has a fascinating old boys’ club account today finally get going
