Mr. Ajay Kumar Pal and Dr. John Collins Kamili The new appointment comes at the time the drug maker’s share price has fallen below the IPO price Kampala, Uganda | ISAAC KHISA | Cipla Quality Chemicals Ltd, the producer of human drugs including anti-malarial and anti-retroviral is now set to receive a new managing director, Ajay Kumar Pal to take over the Luzira-based firm next month.
Kumar will succeed Nevin Bradford, who has been CEO since 2013 and doubling as the e xecutive director and head of Cipla’s Rest of Africa Business-a portfolio, he held prior to his current appointment. Bradford will be will be retiring.
Emmanuel Katongole, the company’s board chairperson, said Kumar who joined the company in February last year as the chief operating officer.
Holding a Master of Business Administration in Management and Leadership from Nelson Mandela University – South Africa and a Bachelor of Pharmacy from the Rajiv Gandhi University of Health Sciences (RGUHS) – India, the new CEO Kumar has over 15 years of experience in the pharmaceutical industry, spreading across South Africa and India.
Meanwhile, Dr. John Collins Kamili, who has been working at the company since 2009 initially as Quality
Assurance Pharmacist and now heading the Regulatory Affairs department was appointed as the company pharmacist effective May this year, replacing Dr. Samuel Opio who left the company on April.30.
Kumar comes at the time the drug manufacturing company’s share price on the Uganda Securities Exchange is trading at an average of Shs100 down from Shs 256.5 per share during the IPO in 2018.
Cipla yet to publish last year results
The company is yet to publish its financial results for the year ended March 2021. In the previous year, Cipla recorded a Shs36bn loss compared to a profit of Shs7bn recorded in the previous year as additional impairment allowance, drop in gross margins and increase in interest on overdraft took a toll on the company.
The company’s impairment allowance on the financial assets increased by Shs3bn to Shs32billion due to delayed payment for drugs supplied to the Zambian government.
However, Katongole said last year that the Ugandan government had engaged with the Zambian government to expedite the settlement of the outstanding balance.“Furthermore, management is also exploring other avenues to recover these funds…any reduction in outstanding balances from GOZ will result in a reversal of the impairment allowance to that extent,” Katongole said.The company’s gross profit reduced from Shs53.48bn to Shs […]
