Vivek Ramaswamy Biography: After the first Republican debate hosted by Fox News, US presidential contender Indian-origin 2024 US presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy gained a lot of new supporters. In Trump’s absence, Ramaswamy stole the show with his wit and witticisms.
Who is Vivek Ramaswamy “Anti Woke Warrior”
The biotech investor and “anti-woke” crusader has a net worth of over $950 million at age 38. Before the market crash, Forbes estimated that he was worth over $1 billion, making him one of the 20 youngest billionaires in the country. However, his net worth dropped to just under $1 billion after the crash.
Mr. Ramaswamy is using his personal fortune to fund his long-shot bid for the Republican nomination, which already includes a campaign plane, a luxury bus, and over $10 million. On the stump, he promotes his brand of “anti-woke” capitalism, mocking social justice initiatives and corporate governance reforms while ignoring discussions of white privilege.
Vivek Ramaswamy Family, Early Life and Education
On August 9, 1985, in Cincinnati, Ohio, Vivek Ganapathy Ramaswamy entered the world. His parents, Geeta Ramaswamy, a geriatric doctor, and Vivek Ganapathy, an engineer with General Electric, are Indian immigrants from the small town of Vadakkencherry in Kerala.
Ramaswamy attended St. Xavier High School, a Jesuit institution from where he graduated top in his class and achieved national prominence as a tennis player. He received his Bachelor of Arts in Biology from Harvard University with honors in 2007 and was an undergraduate member of the Phi Beta Kappa fraternity.
In “The Boston Globe” and “The New York Times,” Vivek’s thesis on “the ethical problems presented by developing human-animal chimeras” earned the Bowdoin Prize for Natural Sciences. Ramaswamy received funding to attend Yale University School of Law as part of The Paul & Daisy Soros Fellowships for New Americans. In 2013, he earned his law degree from Yale.
Vivek Ramaswamy Wife and Children
Apporva Tewari Ramaswamy is Vivek’s wife’s name. She is a clinician and an assistant professor at the Ohio State University’s Wexner Medical Center. They became friends after meeting at Yale.
Reportedly, both Vivek and Apporva attended Yale University to pursue careers in law and medicine respectively. The couple’s two boys, Karthik and Arjun, also have unique names.
Vivek Ramaswamy Early Career
Vivek and Travis May created the technology firm Campus Venture Network in 2007. The Campus Venture Network’s website, StudentBusinesses.com, was a hub for the materials and tools it offered to campus business owners. The Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation bought the firm from Ramaswamy and May in 2009.
From 2007 till 2014, Vivek was a partner at QVT Financial and shared responsibility for the firm’s biotech investment portfolio. Vivek’s entire remuneration during that period was $7 million. Ramaswamy quit his employment at QVT when he was 29 and, with the help of a hedge fund, established Roivant Sciences as an investment holding company.
Vivek Ramaswamy Later Career
Roivant Sciences
Vivek started the pharmaceutical business Roivant Sciences in 2014. Typically, Roivant purchases pharmaceutical medications that have had delays in development. SoftBank sponsored a $1.1 billion funding round for Roivant in 2017.
In 2020, Roivant made a $3 billion sale to the Japanese pharmaceutical giant Sumitomo Dainippon for five products. At the same time, Sumitomo bought a 5% share of Roivant. Because of this agreement, Vivek will get $176 million in 2020.
In January of 2021, Ramaswamy resigned as CEO of Roivant. A few months later, Roivant agreed to a SPAC merger in which the combined business would be worth around $7.3 billion. The value of Vivek’s 7% interest in Roivant at that time was $511 million.
Axovant Sciences
Axovant Sciences, a Roivant affiliate, had the largest biotech IPO to that date in 2015, raising $362 million. Axovant paid $5 million to buy Intepirdine, a medication used to treat Alzheimer’s disease, from GlaxoSmithKline. In the end, the Alzheimer’s medicine didn’t help patients. Before releasing the drug’s failure announcement, Axovant’s market valuation had reached a record high of $2.5 billion. The stock price of Axovant fell by 70% the day the news broke in August of 2017. The firm’s market value jumped to $500 million in a matter of days. The market value of Axovant fell from $500 million in December 2017 to $20 million in April 2022, a reduction of 80%. In 2020, the business became Sio Gene Therapies; its estimated value is $30 million.
Chapter Medicare
In 2020, Ramaswamy co-founded the Medicare navigation platform Chapter Medicare. In 2021, he co-founded and became executive chairman of the Ohio-based firm Strive Asset Management, which received funding from individuals like J. D. Vance and Peter Thiel and institutions like BlackRock.
Strive Asset Management
Strive Asset Management has around $500,000,000 in assets as of November 2022. Midway through 2023, Strive had a $300 million valuation. Vivek has a $100 million investment in Strive due to his one-third ownership. Strive Asset Management is opposed to the ESG framework, which includes considerations of the environment, society, and the company’s management.
Candidate for Presidential Race (Start of Political Career)
Vivek Ramaswamy declared his candidacy for president in February 2023 during an interview on “Tucker Carlson Tonight.” According to Politico, Ramaswamy plans to run for president with an entrepreneurial spirit and novel ideas to attract enough voters to win.
On February 21, 2023, Vivek Ramaswamy formally filed to run for president of the United States in the 2024 election. Ramaswamy had explored a bid for the Senate seat from Ohio in 2022. He has spoken of his respect for former President Donald Trump and stated his intention to conduct a campaign with an entrepreneurial and unorthodox strategy.
When Ramaswamy announced his run for president on Twitter, he stressed the need for American unity, saying that the country’s principles continue to exist despite the differences that have arisen in recent years. Along with his announcement statement was a video discussing his support for free expression.
Vivek Ramaswamy Net worth, Income & Assests
Book Royalties
Royalties from his three publications totaled less than a million dollars. These items are:
- Woke, Inc.: Exposing Capitalism’s Morality-Free Zone
- Nation of Victims: Identity Politics, the Decline of Excellence, and the Road to a “Victim-Free” Society
- Capitalist Punishment: how Wall Street uses your tax dollars to build a country you didn’t want.
Income and Assests Held
- A 7.17 percent investment in Roivant Sciences is worth over $600 million.
- He invested the $260 million he made as Roivant over those 9 years in a relatively safe mix of 60% equities and 40% bonds.
- He has Bitcoin Ethereum, shares in the YouTube rival Rumble, and a piece of the cryptocurrency payments company MoonPay.
- The value of Ramaswamy’s Stake in Strive Asset Management Is Over $100 Million.
- Sumitomo Dainippon, a Japanese pharmaceutical company, spent $3 billion in 2020 to purchase five of them and a 10% share in Roivant. Including $174.5 million in capital gains, Ramaswamy reported a total taxable income of $176 million that year.
- Vivek and Apoorva bought an 11,300-square-foot house in Columbus, Ohio, for $2 million in May 2021. The massive estate has 1.6 manicured acres of land.