Bernard Sherman

Bernard C. Sherman (born 1942), Chairman and CEO of Apotex Inc., is a Canadian businessman and a billionaire. He has a self-made fortune of $US 3.3 billion dollars and is ranked 334 among the world's richest people in 2008 according to Forbes. [ [http://www.forbes.com/lists/2008/10/billionaires08_The-Worlds-Billionaires_CountryOfCitizen_2.html About Bernard Sherman] ]

Business experience

Barry Sherman entered the University of Toronto's Engineering Science program at age 16 and was the youngest to do so. He also graduated from Engineering Science with the highest honours in his class and received the university's Governor General's Award for his thesis. He then received a Doctoral degree from MIT. He is Jewish and has donated a recorded amount of 50 million dollars to the United Jewish Appeal. He is well-known throughout Toronto for his considerable charitable donations, having built a major addition to the geriatric Baycrest Centre, and to other Toronto-area community centers and hospitals. He is married to Honey Sherman, and they have four children.

While at Toronto's Forest Hill Collegiate and completing his university education at University of Toronto, Barry often worked for his uncle Louis Lloyd Winter, at his pharmaceutical company, Empire Laboratories. Empire was the largest Canadian wholly-owned pharmaceutical company at that time, and a pioneer in the generic drug industry (Parke Davis v. Empire Laboratories [1963] , 41 C.P.R. 121; Parke, Davis & Co. v. Empire Laboratories Ltd., [1964] S.C.R. 351). When his uncle would travel, Barry often helped watch over the operations. Empire provided Sherman with the training and foundation for his development of [http://www.apotex.com Apotex Inc.] , one of Canada's leading generic pharmaceutical companies.

In the summer of 1967, directly after completing his Ph.D. in astrophysics at MIT, Barry Sherman pursued the purchase of Empire Laboratories from the executor of Louis and Beverley Winter's estate, as both his aunt and uncle had died in November 1965 leaving four orphaned children. Prior to the purchase, Empire Laboratories was the first to successfully secure the compulsory rights to manufacture Hoffman-La Roche's highly profitable Valium (diazepam), and was one of Canada's largest manufacturers of Pfizer's Vibramycin® (tetracycline), Upjohn Company's Orinase (tolbutamide), and the leading dietary sweetener Saccharin. To facilitate the corporate acquisition, Barry and Joel Ulster (Sherman and Ulster Limited), provided 5% equity options to each of the four children and a 15 year royalty on four of its patented products (Globe and Mail, November 24, 2007). Litigation is currently before the courts concerning the purchase of the corporate assets and brands from the Winter children's estate, as Sherman and his partner never paid the royalties or provided the promised equity in the business. [ [http://www.forbes.com/business/2007/10/22/billionaires-lawsuits-pritzker-biz-cz_lk_1022billiefeuds_slide_7.html?thisSpeed=15000 In Pictures: 10 Billionaire Family Feuds - Forbes.com ] ] .

Barry Sherman realized that the major market for his generic business's future growth lay in the United States. In 1970 he founded Barr Laboratories in New York with US-based partners, and he was its largest shareholder and served as Barr's president [ [http://www.forbes.com/lists/2006/10/EAV9.html Bernard (Barry) Sherman, The World's Richest People - Forbes.com ] ] . Barry has been selling off his Barr shares recently, and as of 2000, he controlled about 33% Barr Laboratories' stock. Barr made headlines and massive share growth when it won the first rights to manufacture generic versions of Eli Lilly's Prozac. Today, Barr Laboratories' head office is in Montvale, New Jersey, and it is publicly traded on the NYSE using the symbol BRL. In 2004, the Company ranked sixth among the world's top ten independent companies in the $11 billion generic pharmaceutical business [ [http://www.barrlabs.com/overview/history.php Barr Pharmaceuticals, Inc ] ] . Barr is Wal-Mart's leading pharmaceutical supplier according to Forbes, and its annual 2007 sales exceeded $2.5 billion US [ [http://phx.corporate-ir.net/phoenix.zhtml?c=60908&p=irol-fundSnapshot Barr Pharmaceuticals, Inc. Financials - Snapshot ] ] .

In January 1972, Sherman and Ulster Limited sold Empire Laboratories to the Quebec-based Canadian operations of publicly traded International Chemical and Nuclear (ICN) of California, for 57,000 shares (Valeant Pharmaceuticals). In 1973, Barry Sherman started Apotex with only a few key former Empire Laboratories' personnel and he incorporated it in 1974. This privately owned and Sherman controlled company is today in the top 15 of the world's largest generic pharmaceuticals with its head office in Toronto; it is Canada's largest Canadian-owned pharmaceutical [ [http://www.apotex.com Welcome to Apotex ] ] .

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