COMPOUND KING

Ande Prathap Reddy has grown Balaji Amines into a ₹2,300-crore speciality chemicals giant and placed India on the global map

- Prerna Lidhoo

IF YOU BELIEVE that you can find rags-to-riches stories only in movies, then Ande Prathap Reddy’s tale will make you sit up. His 10-km walk to school from a remote hamlet in Telangana (earlier Andhra Pradesh) served as an everyday motivation to become a “moneyed man” someday. “I have seen poverty. Those days inspired me to take risks and do something big,” he says.

Reddy was barely 25 when he started his first venture in 1976, with a bank loan of ₹25,000. After dabbling with around eight successful small-scale ventures in RCC (Reinforced Cement Concrete) spun pipes, asbestos cement pressure pipes and the like, he changed tack in 1988. “I diversified because it was no longer viable to run these small businesses,” says Reddy.

By then, he had realised the high export potential of ‘speciality chemicals’. In common parlance, speciality chemicals are either single-chemical entities or mixtures of various chemical ingredients designed for some specific industrial applications. Back then, no Indian manufacturer was considering this sector as a potential business opportunity. “I started Balaji Amines [in 1988] with a small plant using indigenous technology. Alkyl Amines was my competitor, which took its amine technology from a UK company. But, I was the first [Indian] to take a local [amine] technology and perfected it at one-fourth of the price,” he says.