At LI biz lunch, Amneal chief predicts hitting $1B in revenue

Ten years ago, Chintu Patel quit his job as a pharmacist, scraped together $75,000 and founded Amneal Pharmaceuticals, now among America’s largest makers of generic drugs with 700 employees on Long Island.

Now he is hoping to top $1 billion in revenue by 2015.

“We have so much to do. We are not done,” Patel told Long Island business leaders Wednesday at the Hauppauge Industrial Authority’s annual awards luncheon at the Crest Hollow Country Club in Woodbury.

The event drew more than 400 people from a wide spectrum of industries. The cocktail hour entertainment included a Marilyn Monroe impersonator. Among the refreshments were two cheese sculptures (a fish and a swan).

Grassi & Co., the Jericho accounting firm, took home the Large Business Achievement Award. The Kensington Co., a mergers and acquisitions brokerage in Roslyn Heights,  won the Small Business Achievement Award. New Millennium Technology Services was the rookie of the year.

During his keynote address, Patel said the keys to his entrepreneurial success were trusting his instincts, focusing on quality and working had relentlessly. (He also admitted to spending way too much time on his iPhone.)

The company, which sells to Walmart and drugstore chains such as CVS and Rite Aid., recently received state aid to quadruple the size of its factory in South Yaphank and add 400 jobs over five years. Based in Bridgewater., N.J., Amneal also has a factory in Hauppauge and a warehouse in Commack.