296 Nikhilesh Kalra — President, SSP Co., Ltd., an Opella Company

"If you are looking for perfection, you will never try anything new."

"Their ownership is crucial because they are outstanding at implementing it."

"Longevity matters. There is a very direct correlation to trust."

"If it does not work, it is a risk that I take along with you."

"Your job is not to impress me. Your role is to do the best for the organisation."

Nikhilesh Kalra is President of SSP Co., Ltd., a 260-year-old Japanese healthcare company now part of Opella. SSP is best known through its portfolio of branded over-the-counter medicines, including EVE, a market-leading pain-relief brand, as well as products for allergies and colds. The company began as a family business, later became publicly listed and progressively focused its portfolio on consumer healthcare before becoming wholly owned by multinational groups. Kalra built his career in multinational healthcare businesses and worked across several Asian markets and the United Kingdom. He was serving in a Sanofi role in India when he was asked to lead SSP in Japan in 2022. He subsequently guided the organisation through the carve-out of Sanofi's consumer healthcare business into the independent Opella group. His leadership experience in Japan centres on modernising a deeply established company without discarding its history, increasing risk appetite while protecting pharmaceutical quality, and bridging local stakeholder expectations with global business priorities.

Nikhilesh Kalra arrived in Japan knowing that the country would be different, but not fully appreciating how deeply those differences would shape leadership. He had spent his career in multinational companies where junior employees were encouraged to speak up, debate was visible and success was usually framed in terms of outcomes. At SSP, he entered a 260-year-old Japanese organisation operating in healthcare, where hierarchy, quality, continuity and stakeholder alignment were woven into the operating system.

His first important lesson was that formal meetings reveal only a fraction of the decision process. In an industry association meeting, agenda items passed with almost no visible debate. The real conversation had occurred beforehand through one-to-one stakeholder management. Inside SSP, he encountered meetings to prepare for meetings, and sometimes additional meetings before those. The purpose was not simply bureaucracy; the Japan team wanted to appear externally as one aligned entity. Kalra worked to reduce unnecessary