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Colin Huang : From Son of a Factory Worker to the CEO of a Billion Dollar Company ‘Pinduoduo’

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There are rare chances that the destiny of a person meets his talent and help him achieve the things that at a point might be unimaginable. But there are real examples in the past that has proved that in the success of a person his hard work and talent work even more efficiently if his destiny is working with him too. The son of worker Parents, Colin Huang, would have never thought that his brilliance, and his destiny, will coincide and he will have his own rag to riches story. The 13th richest person in China, in just three years. The life story of Huang surely is a great example and inspiration for many.

Colin Huang was born in 1980, in Hangzhou, to the worker-class parents. While in school, he participated and won a medal in a Mathematics Olympiad, after demonstrating an aptitude in Mathematics. This was the point when his destiny started pushing him towards a good life. The prize of the Olympiad was a scholarship to a reputable school in Zhejiang province.

Colin Huang
Image Source: colinhuang.com

In the school, he got to know many elite students and was even introduced to the daughter of the Mayor of the school, as she too studied in his class. This helped him a lot to build up confidence in him and hence became more comfortable in interacting with the most brilliant students of the school.

As soon he completed his school, another opportunity came into his lap, and he was chosen to study at the prestigious Zhejiang University, where he pursued a degree in computer science. In his first year, he was also selected to be a part of the Melton Foundation.

During his college, he started an internship at Microsoft Beijing, where he earned the stipend worth 6,000 yuan. According to an interview, Huang accepted that the stipend he received for the internship was already greater than the salary of his parents altogether, at that time.

After completing his graduation, he went to the University of Wisconsin to pursue a master’s degree. At the university, he was doing exceptionally well, and his professor impressed by his brilliance provided him letters for the recommendation for a few of the biggest tech giants of that time.

After completing his education in 2004, he received the offer letters from three big companies, i.e. Oracle, Microsoft and IBM. Turning down all the three offers, he decided to work with Google, the company which had just filed its IPO in the same year.

Huang joined Google as an engineer. After working for three years with the company, in 2007, he resigned from his post, as he had got tired of flying back and forth, from the US to China, to resolve even the tiniest of matters. By the time, he had earned a lot of good money and was able to take the decision of quitting his job.

He flew back to China and started his first venture, an eCommerce website named Ouku. The website became popular soon, and after three years, in 2010, Huang sold the website. After Ouku, he founded Leqi, another website, and then, Xunmeng, a gaming studio.

All the three ventures he started, paid him well to lead to him to found another venture, Pinduoduo, which is also the most successful venture of the serial entrepreneur, Huang.

Pinduoduo is an eCommerce platform that provides its users with offers on group purchases. The company was founded in September 2015. Within a year, Huang was able to raise investments from the leading companies of China, i.e., Tencent, Gaochun and Xintianyu. The three companies alone invested a worth of US$110 million in company’s B round funding.

In 2018, the company reported the number of users, more than 200 million. On July 26, 2018, the company went public on NASDAQ, and with a US$1.6 billion IPO, it became the largest IPO of 2018. Pinduoduo is one of the youngest companies which is giving a tough competition to the more than a decade old eCommerce giants like Alibaba and JD.com. In fact, it is the third-largest e-commerce company in China by sales numbers, after the mentioned companies.

According to Huan, he had never thought of changing the world, but if he is contributing to that, there is nothing bad in that.

Pinduoduo, gets most of its traffic from the lower-tier cities, such that people belonging to the lower-class are also able to buy things on the website. The success of the company has even made Huang the 13th richest person in China. Currently, he is working as the CEO of the company, and his net worth is estimated to be $15.6 billion.

Duan Yongping : The Secretive Chinese Entrepreneur & the Founder of BBK Electronics

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The competition is not always with others, there are many who wants to compete with their own self, to be their own improved version. The famous Chinese inventor and entrepreneur, Duan Yongping, has similar thoughts on self-improvement. According to him, he does not believe in surpassing anyone, but he focuses on self-improvement. He is the real example of simplicity and brilliance, all together. The chairman and the founder of BBK Electronics Corporation, Yongping, is an inspiring personality, and the source of motivation for many.

Early Life & Career

Duan Yongping was born on 10 March 1961, in Nanchang, Jiangxi, China. He received a graduate degree in wireless electronics engineering from Zhejiang University, in 1978.

duan yongping
Image Source: alchetron.com

As soon he graduated from college, he started his career as a teacher and joined the adult education centre of the Beijing Radio Tube Factory. But soon, he left the job and entered the Renmin University to pursue econometrics, and later, completed an EMBA from CEIBS.

After completing his education, he started working at the state-run vacuum tube plant.

Career as Entrepreneur

During the time Yongping was working at the plant, China was moving towards capitalism swiftly, leading to the formation of many private industries. Influenced by the same, in 1989, Yonping left his job and moved to Guangdong province to try his hands in the business.

In the same year, he joined a newly founded electronic plant in Zhongshan. Soon he became the CEO of the company and was the biggest influence in the success of the company. At the beginning of the company, it was under 2 million RMB debts, but in the leadership of Yongping, the company became one of the leading companies of that time, i.e. Subor Electronics Industry Corporation.

Subor developed the learning computers and was one of the biggest suppliers of the same in China. It also entered into the video-game facilities production market and built its first gaming console named “Subor” embedded with dual-cartridge slots. The console was an instant hit, and even, gave a tough competition to its rival Nintendo.

Yongping left the company on 28 August 1995, when the company was at the peak of success, to found his own venture named BBK. He founded BBK in Dongguan, Guangdong Province, and started with the production of DVD and MP3 players. BBK also started its subsidiary company, Bubugao Communication Equipment Co., that produced the feature-phones and became the biggest manufacturer of the same in the year 2000.

By the end of the same year, there was a fall in the sales, and Yongping was looking for peaceful ways to shut down the company, such that the employees stay unhurt. But then his protege Tony Chen advised him to start a new company.

In 2001, along with Chen Mingyong, Yongping founded Oppo to manufacture and sell music players. The company became the subsidiary of BBK.

At the same time, BBK also started the production of other electronic devices such as television sets, MP3 players, digital cameras, etc.

In 2007, with the launch of the first iPhone, like other cell phone producers, BBK was also inspired to start building those new and revamped smartphones. The famous smartphone manufacturing company Vivo is also the sister company of Oppo and another subsidiary of BBK. In 2009, both Oppo and Vivo started their operation in smartphone production and became the biggest pillars in the success of BBK and Yongping. Currently, both the brands are providing their service in over 100 countries and are among the best sellers.

In 2017, BBK was the second largest smartphone manufacturer in the world, ahead of Apple and Huawei, and sold 56.7 million smartphones in the first quarter of the year.

Currently, BBK is working on improving its smartphone lineup and involved in the R&D for the next-generation 5G network for smartphones. The headquarter of the company is located at Chang’an Dongguan.

Personal Life

Yongping is also active in the philanthropy works and donated US dollar 40 million to Zhejiang University in the year 2006. At the age of 40, he moved to California to focus more on investment and philanthropy works. He was the second largest individual shareholder of NetEase in the years 2002 to 2004.

Yongping is a private person and likes to keep away from the limelight. Even though, his life story is one of the most inspiring ones for not only the people of China but also the world.

Cher Wang: A Brilliant Entrepreneur & Contributor in the Rise of Wireless Devices

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HTC is a renowned name in the smartphone manufacturing industry and is also emerging as one of the leaders in the field of virtual reality. The company headquarter is based in Taiwan and was founded in 1997. It was founded by Cher Wang, H. T. Cho and Peter Chou, as an original laptop and computers, designing and manufacturing company.

The company is known for its innovation, and so is its female co-founder Cher Wang. Cher Wang is one of the most successful woman entrepreneurs in the world and is successfully breaking into this male-dominated industry.

Early Life

Wang was born on 14 September 1958, in Taipei, Taiwan. Her father was a businessman who ran a business of plastic until he died at the age of 92.

Wang completed her high school education from The College Preparatory School in Oakland, California and pursued a bachelor’s degree in economics from the University of California, Berkeley, in 1981.

cher wang
Image Source: talkandroid.com

In 1980, her sister had co-founded a motherboard manufacturing company, named as First International Computer (FIC). Wang joined the company and started her first job in 1982. During her job in FIC, she got the opportunity to travel to several new countries in the world, where she was marketing the motherboard for personal computers.

Founding HTC

While pitching the motherboard features in front of the foreign traders, Wang realised the need of a portable computer system as the desktop computers were big and wired, so taking them to any other place was not that convenient.

After a lot of brainstorming, she thought of an idea to start a computer manufacturing business and founded HTC along with her co-founders H. T. Cho and Peter Chou. In the beginning, the company started with manufacturing Notebook laptops. In 1998, the company was building one of the world’s first touch and wireless hand-held devices.

Initial years were tough, but having the blood of businessman in her veins, Wang was able to foresee the upcoming success, hence invested a huge amount of money in the business. With time, she realized that the laptop manufacturing business is not working according to the plan, and she decided to switch her focus from building laptops to mobile phones. So, HTC started partnering with other companies to build Windows Mobile PDAs and smartphones.

In 2007, HTC acquired Dopod International, and in the next year the company launched its first GSM mobile phone, named HTC Max 4G. In the same year, the company also released its first Android Smartphone, the HTC Dream.

In 2009, the company rolled out its first touch screen smartphone powered by Windows OS, the HTC HD2, and also released its first user interface the HTC Sense.

In 2010, HTC sold over 24.6 million handsets. In 2011, Luxgen adopted the HTC smart technology to build the ‘Think Ahead’ feature for its vehicles such that the software would capture road conditions and potential hazards to its drivers.

In 2011, HTC won the “Device Manufacturer of the Year” in the Global Mobile Awards. In the same year, the company became the third-largest smartphone manufacturer, after Apple and Samsung. In the third quarter of the same year, HTC became the largest smartphone vendor in the U.S. ahead of Samsung and Apple.

The year of 2012 was challenging for the company, earning the lowest profits of all time, but in 2013, the release of HTC One the changed the scenario. In fact, it became the best phone of the year, winning various industry awards. In 2014, the company changed its marketing strategies, and with the launch of HTC One (M8), the company started selling the phones online, resulting in a rise in its sales.

In 2015, HTC partnered with Valve Corporation and launched its first virtual reality head-mounted display, Vive. After suffering by huge losses in the Smartphone industry due to the raised competition, it was Vive, that helped the company survive.

In 2017, Google acquired half of HTC’s staff that had worked on HTC’s design and research, by paying US$1.1 billion to the company. Google employed the HTC manpower in the manufacturing of Google’s Pixel smartphone.

Currently, the company is expanding in the field of Internet of Things (IoT) and virtual reality. In 2018 HTC partnered with the games and apps developer and publisher Animoca, such that to work in the field of games, blockchain, artificial intelligence, machine learning, augmented reality and virtual reality.

Personal Life

Cher Wang is married to Wen-Chi Chen, the CEO of VIA Technologies. The couple has two children. In 2011, Wang and her husband were named as the wealthiest person in Taiwan, with a net worth of US$8.8 billion by Forbes. Wang was also listed in The World’s 100 Most Powerful Women at #56 in August 2012, and 54th most powerful woman in the world in 2014, by Forbes.

Wang is also active in charity and philanthropy works.

Tony Xu : The Co-founder of the Dashing Food Delivery Service ‘DoorDash’

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The food industry is blooming with every second that passes. Now that the food industry has got technology-induced in it, one can order any kind of food, anytime, anywhere. It requires nothing but a simple three taps on your tech-savvy devices. In this growing food industry, DoorDash emerges as a key company leading the change. Tony Xu, the founding CEO of the company shares a success story which speaks that a simple problem can turn on the light in our minds to figure out something innovative.

DoorDash Inc. is an on-demand food delivery service which was founded in 2013 by Andy Fang, Stanley Tang, Tony Xu and Evan Moore. The founding story of DoorDash, as described by Tony, is an ‘unlikely one’.

It was 2012, and all four of the founders were working on an app which focused on building the technology for small businesses. They used to go and talk to the owners of coffee shops and restaurants. It all started when they were in a small macaroon store, in Palo Alto. The manager of the store, Chloe, expressed all the problems in her day to day business. However, as they were about to leave, Chloe showed them a thick booklet, which contained pages of delivery orders, and said, “This drives me crazy. I have no drivers to fulfil them, and I’m the one doing all of it.”

Tony Xu
Image Source: Bloomberg

All four of them had their lightbulb moment. They spent the next few weeks interviewing and questioning other small businesses (nearly 200) and heard the same thing over and over again: ‘Deliveries are painful’. They started coding keeping in mind that they can improve this backlog and were ready with their first prototype within a few hours.

On January 12th, 2013, Palo Alto Delivery was born. The service spread so quickly that all the four members were delivering all over the Stanford campus. In the day, they were students and, in the night, they were delivery drivers. The name ‘Palo Alto Delivery’ was changed to DoorDash, in June 2013, and the delivery drivers were called the ‘Dashers’. “We learnt so much from driving in the streets. Now, anyone who joins the company, has to be a Dasher for at least 1 week,” said Xu.

“When we first started, we were trying to solve our own problems of getting food delivered. But soon, it grew quickly within the Stanford community and beyond. We found out that many families and office workers in the area have the same problem. When we deliver food, it’s as much about delivering happiness as it is about bringing convenience,” DoorDash posted on Medium.

Tony Xu, is a first-generation American. His first job was at his mom’s restaurant. His education includes B.S. (High Honours) in Industrial Engineering and Operations Research from UC Berkeley, M.B.A. from Stanford Graduate School of Business. He was an Arjay Miller Scholar at Stanford. He started his professional career at McKinsey and Company. After that, he worked in Product at Square and led special projects for CEO and CFO at eBay.

When he started DoorDash, his simple mission was to enable every merchant to deliver easily, and that mission has come a long way. DoorDash has drawn investments worth $700 million with key investors being: Khosla Ventures, SoftBank, Sequoia Capital, GIC, Kleiner Perkins Caufield, and Byers. During 2018, the company was valued at $1.4 billion in a round of funding.

In April 2018, DoorDash stepped into the grocery deliveries with a partnership with Walmart. Further, in the year, DoorDash surpassed Uber Eats to become the second largest company in US food delivery sales behind only GrubHub.

The company took everyone by surprise when its valuation took place in February 2019. The company’s value increased 5 times and valued $7 billion when the rounding was done by SoftBank, Vision Fund, DST Global and Y Combinator.

Tony Xu, has also kept the focus of the company on an issue very important to him personally. Project DASH was launched and has since focused on the efforts to save food from wastage.

“Today, more than four and a half years after we first launched the company, we’re still passionate about transforming local businesses helping them thrive in this digital and convenient economy.” Tony Xu, the founding CEO is leading his company with its dashing food delivery services to new heights and is setting an example in front of the world that if innovation stays, then progress to success will always be on the tracks.

Kanika Tekriwal – The CEO & Founder of High Flying JetSetGo

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When it comes to ultimate comfort in travel, airlines are at the top. But the airlines have their path and destinations set, and at the time of emergency, the only thing you can do is, co-operate with them and wait. But then, there come the affordable private flights that JetSetGo provides even on urgent basis. JetSetGo is a multi-faceted organization dealing with low-cost private services. It focuses on delivering innovating and transforming ideas into the general aviation industry. The co-founding CEO of JetSetGo, Kanika Tekriwal is someone who shares a story which is a set example for everyone and speaks that sometimes discomfort can lead to great ideas. All one needs is a spirit and a willingness to fight back their own backlogs.

Kanika hails from a business family but had to face a non-supportive journey. Aviation was looked up as an industry with male dominance, and her parents were against it from the very beginning, but her passion towards her goal changed their thinking and made them support their daughter. “Doing a job in aviation, and being a women entrepreneur are two different things. Though you find women in plenty in the industry, and the majority of them are employees and not the employers. Being a woman employer in aviation is indeed a tough task. When I told my parents about my dream, they were drop-dead against it. But I was adamant, and when they saw a little success and passion of their daughter, they supported me,” said Kanika in an exclusive interview.

Kanika Tekriwal
Image Source: beboldpeople.com

She always aspired to be in the aviation industry, to do something for the betterment of the services. Kanika pursued B.A. in Economics from the University of Mumbai, and later, moved to the United Kingdom for her M.B.A.

It was after her coming back from the UK, in 2011, when she started to think about turning her dream into reality. That’s when a major setback hit her hard. She was diagnosed with cancer. But that did not stop her from achieving her goals. During the nine months of rigorous treatment, she conceptualized the whole idea of JetSetGo. She sensed the need for an aggregator in the private jet space. “I would meet a number of people using private jets who complained that booking one in India was a very shoddy experience, and they felt cheated that the entire private jet experience is a far cry over travelling business or first. At the same time, private jet owners were selling planes due to the escalating costs, regular maintenance, and other hindrances as well as not getting the real pleasure of actually owning an aircraft.”

She started the company ‘JetSetGo’ in 2014 and aimed to cater to a wide clientele. JetSetGo offers exclusive ground services, unparalleled personalized inflight services, the highest aircraft dispatch rate, state-of-the-art technology, and ensures 100% safety. The company is referred to as the ‘Uber of the Skies’ delivering the ultimate pleasure of private aviation. JetSetGo has been showing a massive 7X growth ever since with investments coming in from large personalities, Yuvraj Singh and Puneet Dalmia.

“The very thought of having a chartered plane gives one a feeling, which is beyond imagination. Affording a chartered plane is indeed a matter of luxury today. But, probably after a century, when we all would have gone to dust and bones. People will own their own jets. And I am talking about people with decent earning and not the high and mighty. I believe time will come that in India, too.” said Kanika when asked about the company and indicated that private flying will get cheaper in India. She expects India to become one of the largest private aviation markets in the world, in the next 10 years. She makes sure that in her company, gender equality remains intact as she is a huge supporter of women empowerment.

“JetSetGo, today, has 162 visitors monthly out of which 64.5 are first-time visitors. JetSetGo is looking at capturing a minimum of 20 per cent market share by the end of the year, and we will raise the bar without compromise to indulge and cater to each customer’s need,” mentions Tekriwal. JetSetGo is growing at a rate of 70% per year. Its customer range starts with a net worth of $10 million. In 2016, the company did 4,691 hours of flying with a dispatch rate of 99.2% as compared to 74% of the global average.

JetSetGo acquired Indo Pacific Aviation Limited with an undisclosed amount. “This acquisition now gives a significant boost to our ability to grow our fleet and offer unique services and next-generation aircraft for personalized on-demand mobility”

Kanika Tekriwal, the founding CEO of JetSetGo expresses cancer as her the best experience so far because it gave her a new life to experience. She clearly is an inspiration to everyone and shows that nothing can stop you from achieving non-turbulent flights to success.

The Success Story of Hewlett-Packard (HP)

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HP is not a new name in the IT industry, and the narrative of the company is over 80 years old. The company was founded by two Stanford graduates Bill Hewlett and David Packard, in January 1939.

The two co-founders met each other in a social outing during the time they were studying at Stanford. Both were pursuing a degree in electrical engineering and shared a common interest in starting a business after completing their education. They discussed their idea with their fellowship professor Frederick Terman at Stanford and with his supervision started working on the same.

The two started their company from Packard’s garage in Palo Alto, in 1938, with an initial capital investment of US$538, even without deciding a proper name for it. In 1939, they tossed a coin to decide the name for the company adopting the surname of their names. The toss was among Hewlett-Packard and Packard-Hewlett, in which Hewlett-Packard won.

hewlett-packerd
Image Source: Pinterest

The first product from the company was a precision audio oscillator, the Model HP200A. It was cheap and efficient, and became one of the most successful product, commercially. The same product was also used by Walt Disney Productions, for the movie Fantasia, in certifying the Fantasound surround sound systems installed in theatres.

In 1957, the company went public in its initial public offering.

In the 1960s, Hewlett-Packard started producing the semiconductor devices for the instruments and calculators. In 1966, the company entered into a new business of computer manufacturing and rolled out the accumulator-based design HP 2100 / HP 1000 series of minicomputers, followed by the HP 9800 and HP 250 series of desktop and business computers.

In the 70s the company started producing the advanced business computers, i.e. stack-based HP 3000 computers. During the same time, the HP 2640 series smart computers were also introduced that included one of the first bit mapped graphics displays. The same computer was used to develop the first commercial WYSIWYG Presentation Program, BRUNO, by coupling the HP 2100 21MX F-Series micro-coded Scientific Instruction Set.

In the same decade, the company produced the world’s first handheld scientific calculator HP-35, world’s first handheld programmable HP-65, first alphanumeric, programmable, expandable HP-41C and first symbolic, and the graphing calculator HP-28C.

In the 80s, Hewlett-Packard expanded its business to build printers and scanners for desktop computers. With the rise of the internet, the company registered its website domain as HP.com, on 3 March 1986, becoming the ninth Internet .com domain ever. In 1989, HP acquired the Apollo Computer, and in 1995 it acquired the Convex Computers.

By 1998, the company had become one of the leaders in the desktops, laptops, and servers for many different markets. Later, it also started its online service hpshopping.com, to sell its products online, which was rebranded to “HP Home & Home Office Store” in 2005.

In 2005, due to the merger with Compaq, Hewlett-Packard was facing heavy losses in the business. In 2006, the company offered a new range of products in both hardware and software, reducing the costs. In 2007, the company’s revenues skyrocketed, and HP hit the $100 Billion mark for the first time.

In 2011, Hewlett-Packard launched its first tablet named HP TouchPad, followed by the industries’ first wireless mouse. But by the end of the same year, it announced that it won’t be operating in the tablet and smartphone business anymore, and will focus more on the Cloud, solutions and software business.

In the years 2012-13, the Hewlett-Packard faced a great decline in its profits, cutting down 34000 jobs in the same years.

In October 2014, the news of splitting up of Hewlett Packard into two separate companies came into knowledge. The two wings would do their separate business of personal computers and printer manufacturing. Finally, in November 2015, the company separated into HP Inc. and Hewlett Packard Enterprise, HP Inc. retaining the Hewlett-Packard’s stock price history.

Although the company has seen many ups and downs during its long journey, the vast history of HP has introduced the world with many great inventions. The company also gets credits for many patents and will be known for its contribution to the IT industry.