Singapore CEO’s family gains $1.5 billion fortune from blockbuster IPO

SINGAPORE – In Mr Ravinder Sajwan’s early Silicon Valley career, he blew through his US$3,000 (S$3,800) monthly credit card limit every two days, hustling on a series of technology start-ups.

“We had no money,” the 64-year-old said, speaking of his first attempts at building businesses in the 1990s.

“I would call the card company, say, ‘I’m really sorry, I think I messed up,’ and then got 20 credit cards. At one point, I had 65 credit cards doing just this.”

With the

Singapore listing of UltraGreen.ai

in December, a company that sells fluorescent dye used in surgical imaging, the chief executive has struck gold.

The US$400 million initial public offering (IPO) – Singapore’s biggest primary listing in eight years outside of real estate – handed Mr Sajwan’s family a stake of US$1.2 billion (S$1.5 billion) through their Renew Group, according to filings reviewed by the Bloomberg Billionaires Index for the first time. Renew has a majority stake of over 60 per cent in UltraGreen.

While Mr Sajwan runs the company, he has no direct stakes in it, according to filings. Instead, his sister Indu Rawat and her husband Mahipal Singh Rawat are the ultimate beneficiaries of the windfall through a little-known entity called The Saul Trust. That entity invests globally in a variety of assets via Singapore-based Renew, of which Mr Sajwan is CEO.

Mrs Rawat and Mr Rawat run a Hindu monastery, or ashram, in India called Hanslok that Mr Rawat’s father founded. Entities linked to the two have registered addresses in Singapore, as does Mrs Rawat, who holds a permanent resident status in Singapore, according to filings. The couple did not respond to written requests for comment.

Profitable niche

UltraGreen’s dye, paired with a handheld camera, lets surgeons observe blood flow in their patients. That niche but critical component of surgery had been dominated by firms such as US-based Stryker and Japan’s Daiichi Sankyo before UltraGreen’s ascent.

About a decade ago, Mr Sajwan bought a company producing the dye in Germany for another healthcare investment, but the company could not secure regulatory approvals – a common challenge for companies competing in the fluorescent dye market. So he decided to pivot, patching together a separate product by investing in, acquiring or partnering with distributors of such dyes, as well as platforms that aggregate data and develop software.

UltraGreen now holds an 85 per cent market share in the US, Mr Sajwan said. This is despite it raising the average cost of its dye vials in the market by 60 per cent and 30 per cent in 2023 and 2024, respectively, according to its IPO prospectus.

DBS Group Holdings was the joint bookrunner and underwriter of the IPO. Mr Sajwan, a Singapore PR and US citizen, says he is good friends with DBS CEO Tan Su Shan and her husband Chris Wilson.

Outside of Renew, UltraGreen’s top investors include 65 Equity Partners, a money manager backed by Singapore’s investment company Temasek; London-based private equity firm Vitruvian Partners, which has over US$20 billion in assets; and former Singapore Exchange chairman Kwa Chong Seng. Mr Kwa was deeply involved in marketing UltraGreen’s share sale to investors, according to people familiar with the matter, and now chairs the firm.

Drinks empire

Mr Sajwan was born in the Indian capital of New Delhi. Over the years, his focus has shifted from chips to energy drinks and now healthcare. He co-founded three start-ups that were sold, he said. Acclaim Communications – a maker of computer switches – was bought by Level One Communications in 1998 for about US$120 million. Level One was subsequently sold to Intel for US$2.2 billion.

One of Mr Sajwan’s most successful investments is a production company for 5-Hour Energy, the maker of a zero-sugar energy shot created by close friend and tycoon Manoj Bhargava, whose garishly coloured capsules are found in US gas stations and 7-Elevens across Asia. The business yielded strong dividends for Renew, Mr Sajwan said. 

Mr Bhargava’s connections to Mr Sajwan’s family go back even further. In the 1970s, he lived as a monk in the ashram Hanslok, where he met Mr Rawat, according to interviews with other media outlets. Mr Bhargava did not respond to written requests for comment.

Mr Sajwan says he rises early to hike with a weighted backpack around Singapore’s western ridges, and drinks as many as 16 shots of espresso per day. His portfolio of businesses is managed from his headquarters, a glass-faced building flanked by a petrol station in MacPherson.

Renew runs a mix of firms, including True Hydration, a maker of sugar- and salt-less canned drinks; Cellular Hydration, a pocket-sized electrolyte capsule; and Renew Enhanced Circulation, which is said to boost cardiovascular health via a massage-like pressure treatment, according to its website. BLOOMBERG