Deepika Padukone Builds Her Next Chapter Beyond the Screen

Deepika Padukone has spent two decades as one of Hindi cinema's most recognizable faces. Her more recent work, though, is happening off camera, inside a self-care company she co-founded called 82°E.

The brand sits in skincare and wellness, a category crowded with celebrity launches that fade as quickly as they appear. What distinguishes Padukone's approach, according to a feature by ETimes, is the positioning: minimalist, science-backed products that lean on an Indian sensibility rather than a borrowed Western one. The name itself is a coordinate, a nod to the longitude that runs through India, and the products are framed around discipline and restraint rather than transformation promises.

For an actor, founding a company is no longer a novelty. It has become something closer to a second profession, and Padukone is far from alone in choosing it.

A pattern across the industry

The ETimes piece groups Padukone alongside several of her peers who have moved into business while still working in film. Anushka Sharma co-founded Clean Slate Filmz, a production house behind content-driven projects including the streaming series Paatal Lok. Alia Bhatt started Ed-a-Mamma, a children's clothing label built around sustainability and ethical sourcing. Priyanka Chopra owns Anomaly, a haircare line now sold across international markets, and co-founded Sona, an Indian restaurant in New York. Sonam Kapoor, with her sister Rhea, created Rheson, a fashion label aimed at younger buyers looking for affordable, design-led pieces.

What connects these ventures is less the product than the logic behind them. Each founder is converting public recognition into a consumer brand, but the more durable bet is on ownership. A film role pays once. An equity stake in a company that outlives a given news cycle pays differently, and potentially for much longer.

The wellness wager

Padukone's choice of category is worth examining on its own terms. India's market for premium skincare and wellness has expanded as disposable incomes rise and younger consumers grow comfortable spending on self-care as a routine rather than a luxury. A founder with national visibility starts with an advantage most direct-to-consumer startups would spend heavily to acquire: attention.

That advantage cuts both ways. Celebrity brands often struggle to convince customers that the founder is more than a face on the packaging. The companies that last tend to be the ones where the public figure is visibly involved in the product, the supply chain, and the decisions, rather than the marketing alone. Whether 82°E clears that bar is something the next few years of repeat purchases will answer, not a launch campaign.

Padukone has talked publicly about a disciplined personal routine, and the brand's framing draws directly on that. It is a coherent story, which matters in a category where coherence is rare. It is not, by itself, a business model.

What the cohort signals

The broader shift is the more interesting story. For a generation of Indian actors, particularly women, the film industry has offered fame on terms they did not fully control: roles written by others, shelf lives dictated by others, earnings tied to projects rather than assets. Building a company is a way to own the upside.

It also reflects how India's consumer economy has matured. A decade ago, a celebrity endorsement meant lending a name to someone else's product. Now the same figures are appearing on cap tables, taking founder titles, and absorbing the risk that comes with them. Some of these ventures will not survive. The ones that do will have been built like companies, not extensions of a personal brand.

Padukone's film career is not over. But the work she is doing at 82°E suggests where her attention is moving, and it places her within a quiet, steady realignment in how India's most visible performers think about what they are actually building.