Shri Thanedar
Shri Thanedar is an Indian-born American entrepreneur, author, and politician.
Thanedar was a candidate in the Democratic Party primary for Governor of Michigan in the 2018 election. Thanedar won the City of Detroit and earned 200,645 total votes but finished in 3rd place statewide behind current Governor of Michigan Gretchen Whitmer and former Health Director of Detroit Abdul El-Sayed.
Following the 2018 election, Thanedar moved to Detroit and started a 2020 election campaign for the 3rd District of Michigan House of Representatives.
Early life and education
Thanedar grew up in a lower-income family in Belgaum, India. When his father was forced to retire at age 55, a 14-year-old Thanedar worked odd jobs to support his family of eight. He earned a bachelor's degree in chemistry at 18 and then attended a masters program at University of Bombay. He came to the United States in 1979 to pursue a PhD at the University of Akron, which he earned in 1982. Thanedar became a US citizen in 1988.Business career
Thanedar did post-doctoral work at the University of Michigan before taking a job in 1984 as a researcher at Petrolite Corp.Chemir
In 1990, Thanedar took a job working nights and weekends for $15/hour at Chemir/Polytech Laboratories to learn the business. Thanedar took out a loan to buy Chemir in 1991 for $75,000. Sales in the first year were $150,000 and the business had three employees. By 2005, Chemir's revenues were $16 million and it employed 160 people, including 40 PhD chemists.Thanedar borrowed $24 million from Bank of America to finance seven acquisitions, offering the bank a personal guarantee to back the debt. One acquisition, Azopharma, grew rapidly from $1 million in 2003 to $55 million in 2008. Thanedar's group of companies employed 500 people in 2008.
During the 2007–10 recession in the United States, Azopharma's revenue fell by 70 percent, triggering bankruptcy proceedings by Bank of America. Azopharma was closed and its assets were sold for $2 million. During the bankruptcy proceedings, AniClin, one of Azopharma's research facilities of which Thanedar was the sole owner, was abruptly closed; a 2010 USA Today article claimed that laboratory animals were abandoned at the facility after the company was placed in receivership. Later reports state that animal welfare organizations successfully facilitated the adoption of all animals in the facility and Thanedar denied claims that any animals were abandoned. Chemir remained profitable throughout the legal proceedings and was sold on March 31, 2011, for $23 million. That sale plus the combined assets in the firm covered Thanedar's debt to Bank of America.
Avomeen
Thanedar briefly retired in 2010, then came out of retirement later that year to launch Avomeen Analytical Services, an Ann Arbor-based chemical testing laboratory, with his son Neil. Avomeen was named to the INC 5000 list of fastest-growing companies in the United States in 2015 and 2016. In 2016 Thanedar sold a majority stake in the business to private equity firm High Street Capital. Thanedar shared $1.5 million of his sale proceeds with his 50 employees.Thanedar was named the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year for the Central Midwest Region in 1999, 2007, and 2016.
Lawsuit
In November 2017, a buyer of Avomeen Holdings LLC filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court in Detroit, claiming Thanedar made "fraudulent and misleading representations" of his company's finances in order to sell the majority stake in November 2016. Thanedar denies the allegations, stating that revenues "are anticipated to significantly exceed" those of past periods. Thanedar maintains 40 percent ownership of Avomeen.Political career
Shri Thanedar entered politics when he chose to run in the 2018 Michigan gubernatorial election as a Democrat. Thanedar's political platform includes a $15 minimum wage, public education reform, infrastructure improvements, and increased government transparency.2018 gubernatorial campaign
On April 5, 2017, Shri Thanedar submitted paperwork to raise funds for a potential gubernatorial campaign in Michigan. On June 8, 2017, Thanedar officially announced his candidacy for Governor of Michigan in the 2018 Democratic Party primary. Thanedar pledged not to accept any corporate political action committee donations. Thanedar contributed $10.6 million of his own money to his campaign. Early polling in 2017 showed Thanedar in last place at 2% to 3%. After running a statewide Super Bowl ad in February 2018, Thanedar quickly became the best-known Democratic candidate running for Governor of Michigan. Thanedar won statewide Democratic polls in March and April versus Gretchen Whitmer, the presumed Democratic front-runner.As Thanedar's campaign gained public traction in early 2018, reporters at The Intercept and HuffPost began investigating Thanedar's history. Thanedar had not held elective office before running for Governor of Michigan in 2017, so he did not have an official record as a Democrat. Campaign finance records show that Thanedar made 18 donations to Democratic campaigns and 1 donation to a Republican campaign prior to running for office. However, that one Republican donation, $2,300 to the Republican presidential campaign of John McCain, led to controversy that Thanedar may not be as progressive as he claimed. Political strategists who met with Thanedar before his 2018 campaign also claimed that Thanedar initially questioned whether he wanted to run as a Democrat or Republican in the gubernatorial race. Thanedar denied the claims, stating that he was being criticized by these strategists because he did not hire their firms. Thanedar also faced accusations that laboratory animals were abandoned at one of his former research facilities after that business was placed into receivership by Bank of America in 2010, claims that were denied by Thanedar and later reports.
These controversies hurt Thanedar's campaign and he failed to poll over 30% again. On August 7, 2018, Thanedar received 200,645 votes in the Democratic Party primary, placing him in third behind Gretchen Whitmer's 588,436 votes and Abdul El-Sayed's 342,179 votes. Thanedar's support was heavily concentrated in cities like Detroit, Flint, Inkster, and Pontiac with high African American populations.
Thanedar's campaign had spent more money than any other candidate running in either the Democratic or Republican gubernatorial primaries. The roughly $10.3 million his campaign spent accounted for nearly one third of the cumulative spending of all candidates in the primaries.