VG Siddhartha’s journey: From a brief fling with stock mon of a coffee plantation owner, V G Siddhartha created the Indian rival of Starbucks but his sudden disappearance and a letter by him alluding to pressures from a PE investor to buy back shares have left many questions unanswered Coming from a family that has a 140-year history of growing coffee, Siddhartha initially dabbled in stock trading before actually setting his foot in the coffee business. He initially wanted to join the Indian Army but then envisaged interest in working as an investment banker in Mumbai after completing his Master's degree in Economics from Mangalore University. In 1984, he launched his own investment and venture capital firm Sivan Securities in Bangalore, and began investing the profits from his start-up to buy coffee plantations in Karnataka's Chikmagalu Around this time, he also began taking interest in his family's coffee business. In 1993, he set up a coffee trading company call