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Richard M. Schulze: From School Drop Out To $50 Bn. Company

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Life is just a monotonous symphony without any risks. Success follows only the risk takers who believe in their vision. Today’s billionaires were once just common people struggling to survive. This is the story of one such significant man who changed the way of selling and shopping, the founder of Best Buy – Richard M. Schulze.

Born in Saint Paul, Minnesota, Schulze spent his earlier days in the Central High School. Due to some problems he soon had to drop out of the school. Richard later earned an honorary degree from the University of St. Thomas. He then joined U.S. Air Force at the Minnesota Air National Guard. He further changed his line of work and started working as an electronics salesman.

First Risk
Schulze, while working as electronic salesman, thought of starting something of his own in the electronics industry. He decided to start an audio equipment store called Sound of Music in Saint Paul. Schulze opened this store in 1966 with the money he acquired by mortgaging his home. The business witnessed a massive growth in a small time and was soon expanded to nine stores.

The company launched its first massive sale after one of its store was hit by a tornado. The sale’s instant success brought one another major change in the business. The name Sound of Music was changed to Best Buy and the company shifted to superstore model immediately on an 18,000 sq. ft. area. The superstore offered products at everyday low prices, special discounts which attracted massive attention of people. The introduction of VCR technology profited Best Buy and the company started forty new stores across the whole U.S. in 1989.

From the very first year the company saw huge financial success with $160,000 worth sales. Schulze’s long term vision helped him take crucial decisions which would take the company to greater heights. This decisions included expanding the sales from just stereo equipment, changing the business model, etc. Although they had very less experience selling appliances the company’s business model helped them achieve the massive $9.5 million sales in 1982, the same year when the company acquired the name Best Buy.

Bumpy Rides
The company was in huge success as they touched $240 million sales in 1987 and had become the number one rival of other stores like Highland Superstores. Schulze’s first major loss hit the company hard. The company witnessed 60% decrease in their profits despite of massive revenue being generated. The loss was huge and made the company think of some solution to recover it. This is when creativity worked its magic as the company came up with an idea called “Concept II” which also was considered to be the most innovative idea ever used.

The ‘Concept II’ idea became a massive hit among the customers too and garnered the company a whopping $1.5 billion revenue mark. This huge success of Best Buy came as a hurricane for the other competitors like Highland superstores. The increased sales of Best Buy and drastic losses of Highland superstores led the latter one to shut down their business due to lack of sales. Schulze’s company was in limelight from then and they went on to expand their stores in every city of the US. The company successfully started 95 new stores across the whole US during the period 1996-97. And at the end of 1997 the company had secured $7 billion in revenue.

The company gained so much popularity by 2003 that every store’s every shelf was equipped with almost every electronic device. This included smartphones, washing machines, music players, etc. of every brand.

Richard’s journey so far, has made him a billionaire. Starting from a small town in US to spreading his business worldwide Best Buy has become the largest electronics supermarket in the world. In the current time the company owns more than 1,150 stores all across the world and has crossed more than $50 billion revenue. Success has followed Richard every time he took a daring and risky decision. Their expansion strategy has made them a top superstore company in the world.

Steve Jobs of China: Lei Jun Founder of Xiaomi

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Recognized as the ‘Steve Jobs’ of China, Lei Jun  the Founder of Xiaomi has amassed a net worth of $8.4 billion. Xiaomi Inc. is the world’s fastest growing mobile phone company, who climbed to fourth position in a short span of time.

Lei Jun is not just an entrepreneur but much more than that. He is the mastermind behind the quick and astounding growth of Xiaomi Inc. Since the incubation of this company ten years back, today the company’s net worth is a whopping $45 billion. The company’s motive is to provide quality smartphones with high-end features in affordable price range. And they have stood to their point delivering the smartphones loved by the whole world.

Success only comes after a huge struggle and Lei Jun has faced all those hard times to become the most influential personality today. He was born on 16th December, 1969 in Hubei, China. Jun’s childhood was spent in an under developed industrial area of Wuhan, Central China. He graduated from Mianyang Middle School in 1987 and further went to Wuhan University to take a degree in Computer Science. And in 1991, he came out as a Bachelor’s student of Computer Science.

The most common ‘next step’ after gaining a degree is to find a suitable job. Lei Jun was also in the race to find one. His graduation days were spent in reading about the tech revolutionary Steve Jobs and dreaming to become like him one day. After wandering for a job Lei landed a job offer from Kingsoft, a software giant in China. Just within seven years Lei Jun was announced as the CEO and President of the company. During his time as a CEO Jun started an online bookstore. Joyo.com, in 2000 which went on to become so famous that it became number one fan base for the book lovers till 2004. The rising popularity of Joyo grabbed Amazon’s attention and they acquired it for a mind-blowing price of $75 million.

Lei Jun has made a unique image by not just being a CEO of Kingsoft. He is an active investor who has invested in numerous startups like Vancl.com, YY, UCWeb, etc. Jun has successfully funded more than 70 startups. In the year 2007, Lei Jun faced health complications leading him to resign from the CEO post and settle on Vice Chairman instead. This was when he seriously started thinking upon founding his own dream company, Xiaomi Inc. The company was started and garnered success Jun never even thought of.

Jun was featured in the Top 10 IT figures in 1999, 2000, and 2002. In 2012 the China Central Television chose him as one of the top 10 business leaders in China. Fortune has named Jun as the most powerful business personality in the whole Asia. Jun lives with his wife and two children in China.

Qualcomm: How 7 MIT Graduate Came Together to Create a Company With 23.55 billion USD Revenue

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A simple idea can set a revolution in an era. The mid 1980s witnessed the planting such a seed of an idea which would eventually take over the technological world. Seven brilliant and visionary minds set up to meet and discuss about setting up Quality Communications. The seven minds Irwin Jacobs, Andrew Viterbi, Harvey White, Adelia Coffman, Andrew Cohen, Klein Gilhousen and Franklin Antonio invented wireless communication system now used in almost every electronic device.

The story began in 1985 when these MIT graduates gathered at Irwin Jacobs’ house to discuss the idea of developing a wireless and quality communication system. The company successfully signed its first contract to work on the unique digital wireless technology – CDMA. The technology is used by the US military to have secure communications. The company, in 1988, launched products like OmniTRACS satellite locating and messaging service which tracks the vehicles along their route.

The initial days of developing CDMA were challenging for the founders. With only six months on working on the technology they had to demonstrate their product before potential investors. Irwin Jacobs, however, confidently walked on the stage and demonstrated the product which would set history in the wireless industry. The first CDMA technology was then known as IS-95. Since then, Qualcomm has successfully established CDMA2000, WCDMA and LTE technologies which are widely used in mobile phones.

Qualcomm, in 1999, took a big step and sold their base station to Ericson which was then followed by selling phone manufacturing to Kyocera. The decision came with a mutual consent to completely focus on developing and selling ASICs which implemented the others. This helped the company to become the largest semiconductor company in the world. A common person can find their chipsets even in their home in devices like TV and smartphone.

The Big Leap
No other company has acquired as many companies as Qualcomm has from 1997 to 2014. Qualcomm has acquired nearly fifty technological companies that are directly or indirectly related to their sole products. In 2012, the company invented yet another path-breaking chips called Snapdragon chips. This chips are mostly used in smartphones by giants like Xiaomi and Samsung. Apple uses modems developed by Qualcomm and not the Snapdragon chips.

Game of Strategies
The founders have played a strategic game by developing something which every device must have and the companies developing those devices have to license it before using. For example, the 3G and 4G interface standards are the product of Qualcomm’s CDMA. The company aims to develop CDMA at much more advanced level. The upcoming upgrades would add to the efficiency of the already available chipsets by multiple times.

Qualcomm today has estimated revenue of 23.55 billion USD. Qualcomm’s contribution to the world of wireless technology is beyond appreciation. We might just think for a moment what if there was no wireless technology? There would be no WiFi, Bluetooth, etc. The world would be a messy place with all those wires around. Qualcomm lives on the motto ‘Enabling the wireless industry’ and it has stood to its slogan since its inception and will continue to do so in future too.

Pierre Omidyar – The Founder of eBay

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Brilliant ideas are born out of the curious minds. The ideas or problems often roam around and everyone fail to notice them except some brilliant curious minds. These brilliant minds are the ones responsible for smartphones, computers, airplanes , tv, refrigerators; literally everything that has made our daily life so easy. One such extra-ordinary mind is Pierre Omidyar, a man who turned into a billionaire just at the age of 31. Omidyar, for the first time, brought the auction business on the online platform and connected hundreds of thousands of buyers and sellers through his website – eBay.

Pierre Omidyar is a French born Iranian American businessman and philanthropist. Born in 1967, Pierre’s interest in computers began from high school. He would skip the gym sessions to spend that time at the computer lab. This behavior got him his first job instead of teacher’s scolding. At the age of 14 he was put on the task to create a program that would generate catalogue cards for the library by the principal. Starting from a mere $6 per hour and earning almost 8 billion, Pierre has set a wonderful example for the whole world.

Pierre went on to Tufts University for his graduation in computer science and then joined a company to develop the Macintosh software. Before starting his software company Ink Development Corp in 1991, Pierre worked for Apple’s subsidiary Claris. His Ink Development Corp was purchased by Microsoft in 1996 and also changed its name to eShop. Just a year before that is in 1995 a multi-billion dollar idea had already taken birth in Pierre’s mind.

During the summer of 1995 Omidyar wrote a code for a portal called Auction Web on his own website. The purpose was to let people list the items for auction. Surprisingly, this idea grabbed stupendous attention that he had to set up a whole new website which was devoted just for online auctions. This site would later be known as eBay. With the launch of new website he also started charging a nominal fee for listing the items for auction. The charges would be anything from 25 cents to $2.

The pace at which eBay was growing made Omidyar to quit his job at General Magic, a company backed by Apple. Since then he started devoting his entire time to grow eBay. Omidyar was announced as the chairman of eBay in 1998 with Meg Whitman as the president and CEO of the company. Under Whitman’s leadership the company expanded its branches to Australia, Canada, Japan, UK, Germany, etc. At the end of 1998 the company had generated $750 million revenue and hosted 2.1 million buyers and sellers. The online auction strategy was then adopted by Amazon in 1999.

Omidyar is on the board of directors at ePeople, an online marketplace for technical support. He is married to Pamela Wesley and has three children. The couple also run a philanthropic firm Omidyar Network. This network is dedicated for journalism and launched the First Look Media along with Glenn Greenwald, the man who published government documents leaked by Edward Snowden. In 2014, the company published its first online copy The Intercept. Omidyar believes that journalism should have its own independent voice for the benefit of democratic society.

Richard Branson: How A Dyslexic Kid Became Owner of 400 Companies

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Can you imagine a dyslexic kid to be growing up and becoming a beast of the business world? Meet Richard Branson, the owner of Virgin group of companies. Richard Branson ventured into the business world at the tender age of 16. From dropping out of school and starting his own business to grow it into a billion dollar mountain, Richard has set an example before today’s youth to take risks and think bigger.

Richard Charles Nicholas Branson, son of Edward James Branson and Eve Branson, was born on 18th July, 1950, in Surrey, England. His father was a barrister and mother, a flight attendant. Richard’s poor performance in academics, at the age of 13, worried the teachers during his time at the all-boys Scaitcliffe School. He dropped out of school at the age of 16 due to continuous problems of dyslexia. This was the turning point in Richard’s life which would give birth to what would become a multi million dollar company – a youth-culture magazine, Student.

The magazine’s aim was to publish student written articles and various creative pieces. Richard sold first 50,000 copies of the magazine for free and covered the costs through advertising. He garnered $8000 worth of advertising money in the first edition itself. The next big idea Branson decided to transform into a business was the mail-order record company called Virgin. This would also help him in supporting his magazine. Branson soon expanded the mail-order business and started a record shop at the Oxford Street, London. In 1972 he successfully launched a recording studio in Oxfordshire, London. This school drop-out was on a greater mission and his next steps would significantly make him the smartest business man in the world.

The launch of Virgin Records also launched the careers of singers and musicians. The first artist, in 1973, on the label was Mike Oldfield who’s single ‘Tubular Bells’ was a record hit and stayed on the UK charts for 247 weeks. Branson, taking the advantage of Oldfield’s success, signed up numerous artists and then the world saw the rise of aspiring musical groups like Sex Pistols, The Rolling Stones, Genesis, etc. The back to back hits from these artists helped Virgin music to reach a position in top six record companies in the world.

The next big leap Richard Branson took was venturing into the airlines business. He expanded his businesses and started the Voyager Group in 1980 and Virgin Atlantic Airlines in 1984. Virgin was rapidly becoming a brand name in the world. Branson faced a major fall of his company in 1992 when the loss was immeasurable. This crushed Branson and he had to sell the company for $1 billion to Thorn EMI. When everything was lost Branson made up his mind to hold strong the music business. And in 1993, he launched Virgin Radio which was followed by V2, another record company in 1996 thus launching the careers of artists like Tom Jones.

Branson’s further major achievements were starting a train company, a mobile phone company, a luxury game preserve and finally a space tourism company named Virgin Galactic. The test launch of Spaceship Two was so massive a success that about 500 people have already booked tickets to ride on Virgin Galactic Spaceship. The company’s next venture is to launch luxury cruises and plans to sail its first cruise in 2020.

Richard’s massive success has set tremendous inspiration for entrepreneurs all over the world. He lives with his wife and two children, Holly and Sam, at Necker Island residence. Branson also gives motivational speeches and is an active supporter of charity organizations.

Biz Stone- From An Undergraduate To A Net Worth Of US$200 Million

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A creative mind knows no boundaries. This statement is as true as it sounds. A person with even a slightest bend towards creativity will always be on the edge of his mind to introduce a unique idea into this world. Born on March 10, 1974, Christopher Isaac Stone, also known as Biz Stone, is an American entrepreneur and one of the co-founder of world’s popular microblogging app Twitter. Stone is a perfect example of a kid who badly wanted to enter the tech-business world. His first start-up was way back in 1999 named as Xanga. It is a weblogs, photoblogs, and social networking profiles host.

Stone attended three educational institutions during his academic phase. He initially graduated from Wellesley High School and then he attended Northeastern University and University of Massachusetts, Boston. Although attended, Stone did not complete his graduation in either of them. He was a nerd from high-school itself and was eager to break into the technological industry.

The Story of Co-founding Twitter
To be an entrepreneur you’ve to be hundred times smarter than everyone. Biz Stone gripped this formula into his mind and applied it at the very early stages in his career. Stone was one of the people working in the building phases of Twitter along with the man behind the idea i.e. Eve Williams while working on Odeo, which was a pod-cast startup. One fine day, Stone mailed Eve and asked a courageous question, “Maybe this is inappropriate, but if I don’t ask, I’ll never know! What do you envision my title to be? Is there a chance I could be called the co-founder?”

This question, a dare in itself, set a mutual understanding between Eve Williams and Biz Stone which would further help them grow the company multiple folds. Eve, after lots of thought turmoil, finally decided to take Stone on board as the ‘co-founder’ of Twitter and gave him 3% share in the company.

A Multi-level Entrepreneur
Biz Stone has never experienced taking a halt in his career. From the beginning itself he had engrossed himself into multiple businesses. He is a leading investor and encouraging advisor in the startup community. He sits on the board of director chair at Beyond Meat, Medium, Workpop and Polaroid Swing. Stone has worked for Google for two years from 2003 to 2005. Stone own’s a start-up, Jelly, a one-of-a-kind search engine which would have a person to answer every question posted on it.

Stone’s creative level is not just bound to tech-space but to the visual storytelling medium too. He, in collaboration with Ron Howard and Canon USA, debuted as a director for a short film titled Evermore. Along with Natalie Portman, Stone was an Executive Producer of the documentary Eating Animals. For some personal reasons Stone left Twitter some years back but has recently, in May 2015, announced his comeback in Twitter. Stone was awarded the Doctor of Laws degree by the Babson College in 2011. He has published three informational books titled Blogging Genius Strategies for Instant Web Content in 2011, Who Let The Blogs Out? In 2004, and Things a Little Bird Told me in 2014. Stone is married to Livia and has a son Jacob and currently resides in Marin County, California.

Evermore from Augussta on Vimeo.