Why I keep the plant in Anand — not Ankleshwar, not Mumbai
An honest take on why running a regulated pharma manufacturer from Anand is the right operating decision in 2026 — and why Charotar deserves more credit than it gets.
Every younger founder who comes to visit our plant asks me, somewhere in the second hour, why we are still in Anand rather than Ankleshwar or Vapi where the larger Gujarat chemical clusters operate — or, alternatively, why we don't have a Mumbai corporate office. I have run Laksh Finechem from Anand long enough to be confident in the answer.
Charotar is its own pharma cluster
The Charotar region — anchored by Anand, Nadiad and Vallabh Vidyanagar — has had a pharma and fine-chemicals presence for decades. It is overshadowed in conversation by Ankleshwar (bulk chemicals) and Vapi (commodity chemistry), but it has quietly developed into one of the more disciplined regulated-pharma clusters in Gujarat. The talent pipeline from CHARUSAT, Sardar Patel University and the Vallabh Vidyanagar institutes feeds directly into local manufacturers. The Pollution Control Board posture is realistic. The municipal infrastructure works.
Vithal Udyognagar specifically
GIDC's Vithal Udyognagar estate is one of those Indian industrial pockets that outsiders underestimate. The infrastructure was laid for chemical manufacturers decades ago — effluent handling, power reliability, road access for solvent and acid logistics. The next-door units include established pharma intermediates suppliers, contract research operations and packaging support. Operating costs are a fraction of Vapi or Ankleshwar for the same regulatory standard, and customer audits land here with no friction.
Proximity to the talent
A regulated pharma plant runs on chemistry graduates, analytical scientists, regulatory affairs personnel and skilled production operators. Charotar's Vallabh Vidyanagar academic ecosystem produces all of these at scale and at a cost structure no Mumbai or Ankleshwar address can match. Retention is also higher — people are home, not displaced. Over a decade of operating, the retention difference compounds into significant capability stability.
What the prestige address gets wrong
Indian SaaS culture has, over the past decade, normalised the idea that the only legitimate corporate address is BKC, Powai or one of the Bangalore submarkets. For tech businesses with venture investors as the primary stakeholder, that's a defensible choice. For a regulated manufacturer whose primary stakeholder is the QC auditor from a European or Japanese pharma customer, it is an irrelevant choice. The auditor is auditing your plant, not your corporate-office lobby. The plant is in Anand. The address should be where the plant is.
What I tell founders considering the question
If your business is regulated manufacturing, real-asset distribution, or any operating category where the work is physical and the customer is auditing the work — your headquarters should be where the work happens. That is almost certainly not Mumbai. For Gujarat-based pharma and chemicals, that often means Charotar, sometimes Saurashtra (Rajkot, Bhavnagar, Jamnagar), sometimes a specialised cluster like Ankleshwar — but always close to the manufacturing.
Stop apologising for the home district. The most enduring Indian business families in pharma — across Charotar, Saurashtra, Gandhinagar and Mehsana — built their operating spine from Tier-2 cities and only later opened representative offices elsewhere if and when a specific function demanded it. The order matters: build the business from the source, layer the metro presence on top when it serves a specific function. Don't do it the other way around.
Got a question on what you've just read — or a project that touches one of the categories above? Write directly to the office.
First-generation Indian industrialist. Founder and Managing Director of Laksh Finechem — a WHO-GMP, FDA and ISO-certified manufacturer of APIs, iodine derivatives and specialty chemicals.