Arjun Juneja

About

When Arjun Juneja joined Mankind Pharma as a 23-year-old nearly 17 years ago, the company was a privately held entity with annual revenues of around `700 crore. As the son of co-founder and chairman Ramesh Juneja, his role in the family-run business was not confined to a single function. Instead, he was expected to oversee virtually every aspect of the company’s operations. Cut to 2026. Mankind, a public-listed company since 2023, is a `14,278-crore pharmaceutical major with Arjun serving as its chief operating officer (COO). “I may have officially become COO in 2021, but I had been performing that role, say from 2012 itself,” he says. Arjun is known for driving innovation, operational excellence, and global expansion. “Mankind has always been a sales-driven company. We were never an R&D, or manufacturing-focussed firm. That focus has come in since the time I joined,” he says. In fact, Mankind did not have its own manufacturing facilities in the initial years. Today, it has more than 21 manufacturing sites and five R&D centres. Currently, Mankind is No. 1 in generating prescriptions, No. 2 in terms of sales volume, and the country’s fourth-largest pharma major with a market share of 4.7%. Arjun’s biggest focus is to increase Mankind’s market share in chronic therapy segment in the next few years, and develop biologics for the global markets.