LOCAL SUCCESSFUL ENTREPRENEURS

HENRY SY

Henry Sy’s story was a ‘rags to riches’ kind of tale. Born in Xiamen, China in

November 1924, Henry Sy was not born with a silver spoon in his mouth. Wanting to

escape poverty, Henry followed his father to the Philippines only to experience a

miserable youth in a foreign country. Sy struggled hard living in a foreign country as an

immigrant and had to learn the local language. Determined to become successful, he

worked hard day and night to provide for his needs.

Sy started out with a small sari-sari store business that helped them in their day-

to-day life. Sy and his father lived in a small space until the fruits of their labor made

them successful in the following years. However, when the Philippine economy

collapsed in World War II, their store burned down that forced his father to go back to

China. Henry Sy stayed in the Philippines and built his own shoe business in Marikina.

Sy did not have an overnight success. He enrolled himself to school and was

able to graduate college with a degree in commerce from Far Eastern University. Sy

also changed legal names, sold rejected and overrun shoes, plus many other setbacks

that he had to face early in life. He did not give up and pushed through maybe because

he knew that something big, which is what he has now, is about to come.
 After a series of failures in his business, Henry Sy stood back up and persevered

to attain his goal. He established a small shoe store in Quiapo, Manila in 1958 named

“Shoe Mart” that eventually marked the establishment of SM Prime Holdings. Now with

three of the most valuable companies in the Philippines: SM Investments Corp. and SM

Prime Holdings Inc. valued at Php1 trillion each and BDO Unibank valued at around

Php 635 million, he has become the richest man in the country for 11 consecutive years

since 2005 and ranked 52nd in Forbes World Billionaires List of 2018.

TONY TAN CAKTIONG

Known to be the man behind the country’s famous bee, Tony Tan Caktiong is

another rags-to-riches story – from owning a small ice cream franchise, to heading

some of the Philippines’ most famous food chains.

Born third of seven siblings, Tony Tan Caktiong was from a poor family in China

who immigrated to the Philippines in hope that they may have a better life. His family

helped each other out, establishing a restaurant business in Davao which enabled

young Tony to study Civil Engineering in the University of Santo Tomas.

 When he was 22, Caktiong decided to shell out P350,000 in an ice cream parlor

franchise. He opened Cubao Ice Cream House and Quiapo Ice Cream House. As their

business becomes more and more successful, they started to hire more people to help

them manage it. Two years later, he decided to serve hamburgers, fried chicken, and

spaghetti as people began to tell him that they don’t want to eat ice cream all the time. It

was then that they decided to rebrand and change their name to “Jollibee” as it

represents them as a company, and the people that they cater to – hardworking and

happy.

McDonald’s came into the picture not many years later, but they failed to take

over Jollibee’s popularity as, according to Caktiong, they don’t know the local food

culture. Filipinos have a sweet taste on food, so Jollibee decided to serve spaghetti with

a sweeter flavour. Filipinos like to smell everything they eat, which is the reason behind

the “Langhap Sarap” tagline they have been using for a while now.

As years go by, the Jollibee group grew bigger. Caktiong partnered up and

established a couple other food chains including Chowking, Red Ribbon, Greenwich,

and Delifrance. Aside from bringing Jollibee, Chowking, and Red Ribbon to other

countries, they’ve also established new food chains in China and Taiwan which suit the

tastes of the people there.

As of 2016, Tony Tan Caktiong ranked 6th in Forbes’ Philippines’ 50 Richest. He

was also awarded the Entrepreneur of the Year and the Ernst and Young Entrepreneur

of the Year in 2004.

 LUCIO TAN

Lucio Tan was born on July 17, 1934 in China’s Fujian province. His family

moved to Philippines, in Naga, where he was a child. He worked his way through

college studying Chemistry in Far Eastern University but quit before graduating, set up a

business that deals with scrap in the late 1950s and and later on found a job in a

tobacco factory where he was tasked to buy leaf tobacco in the Ilocos provinces.

Because of this experience, Lucio Tan started his own cigarette company named

Fortune Tobacco in 1966. It was also during this time when his close friend Ferdinand

Marcos was newly elected as President. The tobacco business was a success and it

expanded introducing a budget brand ‘Hope’ in 1975. By year 1980, Fortune Tobacco

was the Philippines’ largest cigarette manufacturer.

In 1977, Lucio Tan acquired from the Philippine Government the then bankrupt

bank General Bank and Trust Co. (Genbank) for only P500,000 which was described by

many as a sweetheart deal. It was later renamed to Allied Bank.

In 1982, Lucio Tan established and put up Asia Brewery where he used to his

benefit, the Marcos ruling that lifted the ban on the establishment of new beer

companies. Back then, it was the only brewery allowed to compete with the market

leader San Miguel Corp.

 In 1993, Lucio Tan secured control of the country’s airline carrier Philippine Air

Lines (PAL).

While a lot of articles say that Lucio Tan benefited a lot from tax concessions and

privileges that the Marcos Regime gave to him in exchange for a rumored 60% on all

his shareholdings, on December 7, 2007, the Philippine Supreme Court affirmed the

decision dismissing the state’s sequestration of Lucio Tan’s companies. The court’s

decision says that “there can be no question that indeed, petitioner’s orders of

sequestration are void and have no legal effect.”

In 1995, he founded yet another company in the aviation industry. The Macro

Asia Corporation was envisioned to be the leading provider of aviation and logistics

services. This vision has become a reality as Macro Asia Corporation is now the

provider of technical ground handling, engineering and maintenance services, and

catering services to majority of the international airlines.

In 2000, Tan has become the majority stockholder of Philippine National Bank.

The merger of PNB and Allied Bank is expected to be completed before the end of this

year.

HIS COMPANIES DEAL WITH LIQUOR, TOBACCO, AVIATION, BANKING

AND REAL ESTATE. THSE ARE;

 Asia Brewery, the 2nd largest brewer in the Philippines.

 Tanduay Holdings, one of the world's largest rum makers.

 Fortune Tobacco, the largest tobacco company in the country.

 Philippine Airlines, the Philippines' Number 1 Airline and Aviation Company and

Asia's FIRST Airline

  University of the East one of the most financially stable universities in the

Philippines in terms of assets.

 Philippine National Bank, the 5th largest bank in the country.

 Allied Bank, the Philippines' 8th largest lender (Merged with Philippine National

Bank).

 Eton Properties Philippines, the global real estate brand of the Lucio Tan Group.

To date, Lucio Tan's Group of Companies provides jobs to 50,000 people. To

these employees, Lucio Tan is simply Kapitan. A nickname that is very much

appropriate to him as he was able to navigate his vast businesses through rough seas

and tough times.

Today, Lucio Tan is still one of the richest people in the Philippines ranking him

as second to Henry Sy last year 2008 with a total asset of %1.5 Billion. His Lucio Tan

Group of Companies now owns several industries that include liquor (Tanduay

Holdings, Inc. and Asia Brewery), tobacco (Fortune Tobacco), aviation (Philippine

Airlines), banking (Allied Bank and Philippine National Bank), real estate (Eton

Properties Philippines), and education (Univerity of the East).

SOCORRO RAMOS
 Socorro Ramos or more popularly known as Nanay Coring is a 92 year old

entrepreneur who was born in September 23, 1923 at the rural community of Sta. Cruz,

Laguna. Growing up in a big extended family, Socorro saw how her parents and

grandparents struggle through life. Feeding the six of them, children, was a hard task.

So, her parents and grandparents really worked hard to give them a comfortable life.

Her parents were already entrepreneurs back then – selling different stuff from slippers

to perishable goods. Her grandparents on the other hand, had a stall in the market.

Everything seemed okay then, but then Socorro’s grandparents went bankrupt because

of untallied loans and borrowed stuff from the store by the buyers. Their business fell

which left them with no choice to transfer to Manila.

If it was hard in Sta. Cruz, it was a lot harder in Manila. Her older siblings were

forced to work during weekends because every penny they got really matters. Her

sisters worked in a candy and bubble gum factory. Socorro at 10, also have managed to

find a job during summer breaks. Young Socorro was hired to peel off the paper used in

old cigarettes so that it can be reuse to make new fresh cigarette sticks. She received 5

centavos per pack of cigarettes. She thought that the pay so low, so channeling all

entrepreneurial skills out there, she hired kids from their neighborhood to do the job, but
with only a low cost – two pack for only 5 centavos. She has additional cut and

incentives from doing the work fast.

Despite their economic status, her parents pushed all of them to finish their

studies even until high school; so Socorro managed to finish at Arellano High School.

After graduating, she immediately find a job. Lucky her, she ended up as a salesgirl at

the Goodwill Book Store, owned by the Ramos family, the family of her husband-to-be

then. That was the beginning of change little-by-little success of their family. Since she

got in, her siblings also applied for some work in the companies owned by the

Ramoses. Years after, Socorro’s brother Manuel, married one of the Ramos children.

Since the bookstore was doing fine, many branched opened up. And in 1940, the

Ramos needed someone to look after and manage the branch along Escolta Street.

Jose Ramos decided to ran it, together with Socorro. And you know what happened

next.

Their love story was a forbidden kind. Her parents did not agree to it, because

Socorro was just 18 then. But, believing that true love knocks only once, Socorro risked

everything just to be with Jose, even her being disowned by her own family. Her family

was so furious at her, that they even considered her dead. The hated was only relieved

after she gave birth. It was a hard period for the new couple. The personal hardships

they have undergone have also shaped them to become the best entrepreneurs they

can be. The branch that they used to manage together was named National Book Store,

because it was located at the ground floor of Panciteria Nacional. N And among all the

bookstores, National Book Store is considered to be the most resilient one. Here are

three reasons why.

 First triumph was during the Japanese occupation. Managing and building the

bookstore during those times was really a difficult task. Japanese were so picky and

choosy about the reading materials, so if ever they found a single piece that contradicts

their values, they would just destroy the book; tear its pages off. All in all, those books

were just gone to waste. So, National Book Store really incurred a lot of loses during

those times.

Second triumph was during the Post-war. It was a relief that the Japanese were

drawn out of the country, and the relatively kind Americans were not as brutal. But, what

happened was, the physical store was damaged during the war. So, to be able to rebuilt

it by selling unused greeting cards and uncensored books, which they had hidden in

their home.

The third triumph was in 1945. Since the war has damaged their store, they had

to rebuild it someplace else. So they chose Avenida as the place to rebuild their store

and start anew. But then again, there came a strong typhoon that soaked all their stuff

off. All they’re left was with were wet and tore down books. So again, they have to

rebuild the store from scratch.

These three periods in Socorro’s life has really tested her resilience and values

as an entrepreneur. Today, National Book Store is considered as the largest chain of

bookstores in the country. They have ventured into several businesses already such as

a convenience-type store named NBS Book Express, publishing companies named

Cacho-Hermanos printing press, Anvil Books and Capitol-Atlas Publishing, another

bookstore named as Powerbooks, music store named Tower Records and Music One,

Gift Gate, the home of Hello Kitty and Swatch and a department store named Crossings
department store. Socorro’s children and relatives ran all these.

At 92, Socorro only acts as the General Manager of the National Books Store.

She said that it does not matter if you are born poor, because you are not destined that

way, if you only believe you can. Moreover, being an entrepreneur is more of passion

and dedication, rather than capital. What matter is how much you want to do better and

to what to extent you are willing to work hard to achieve that. Stumbling down three

times does not matter but getting up hundreds of times does. So, to all aspiring

entrepreneurs out there, so let us all be like Socorro Ramos, the Matriarch of the

National Book Store.

MARIANO QUE

When Filipinos need medication, a couple of names usually come up: Generika,

The Generics Pharmacy, Watsons, and the most well-known of them all, Mercury Drug.

Mercury Drug has been synonymous with quality pharmaceuticals and it owes its

success to one man who recently left us: its founder, the late Mariano Que.

His company may not have been the first drugstore in the country, but his

pioneering spirit behind the pharmaceutical retail industry paved the way for all the rest

that followed.

It all began with P100 and a bottle of Sulfiathiazole

 P100. That was all Mariano Que had in his pocket after World War II. An

employee of a drugstore prior to the war, Que knew that Filipinos would need the

“miracle” drug sulfathiazole, believed to cure many (if not all) sorts of diseases and

illnesses.

He saw an opportunity to help his countrymen by buying the bottle from a peddler

in Bambang St. He then sold these tablets (which he knew was genuine sulfathiazole

thanks to the ‘W’ on the tablets) per piece to make it more affordable. After making a

profit, he was able purchase other medicines and a pushcart so he can sell his

medicines to the public.

He continued selling medicines off of his pushcart until he was able to save

enough to put up the first Mercury Drug store on March 1 along Bambang St.

More than 70 years later, Mercury Drug is still at the forefront of Philippine

pharmaceutical services, with over 1,000 stores nationwide. It’s also the first to use a

central computerized and temperature-controlled warehouse, 24-hour service, and

pharmacy counseling.

More than just a businessman

Que proved to be more than just an enterprising businessman. He founded the

Mercury Drug Foundation (MDFI) as a way of giving back to Filipinos for their support

throughout the company’s 70-year existence.

Today, MDFI helps Filipinos across the country mainly through these programs:

 Operation Bigay Lunas – free medical services and medicines to underserved

communities
  Operation Pa-Tubig – access to water for marginalized waterless

communitiesnationwide, done in partnership with the Philippine Business for

Social Progress

 Bantay Kalusugan – free health profiling, screening, counseling, and education

activities for non-communicable diseases

 Pharmacy Scholarship – full scholarships given to third and fourth year

Pharmacy students enrolled in member schools of the Philippine Association of

Colleges of Pharmacy (PACOP).

They also give out awards of excellence for Math and Science (Gawad Talino);

search for, nurture, and train future leaders (Sagip Talento); and provide immediate

relief assistance in the form of medicines or hygiene packs.

He has also been conferred an honorary Doctor of Humanities degree by the

University of Sto. Tomas College of Medicine for his pioneering spirit behind the

pharmaceutical retail industry and his advocacy for affordable medicine and assistance

to the needy.

Apart from the honorary degree, he has also received a lot of awards, including:

 President’s Award: Plaque of Merit, Most Prestigious Drugs Manufacturer and

Distinguished Civic Leader in 1973

 Award of Distinction by the Philippine Chamber of Health and Pharmaceutical

and Non-Pharmaceutical Industry in 1986

 Father of Philippine Health and Wellness Retailing by the Philippine Retailers

Association in 2012

So, where can your P100 take you?

 ALFREDO YAO

When you hear the name Alfredo Yao and you’re of a certain age, you tend to

only think of one thing and one thing alone: Zest-O. It’s the country’s largest juice

brand, and can be found in almost every lunchbox of every kid that goes to school.

He’s one of the most resilient businessmen in the Philippines, and has built his

legacy on hard work and perseverance, as well as showing tenacity for always finding

better ways of doing things.

Early years

Alfredo M. Yao was born on November 23, 1943 to the simplest of families. The

eldest among his siblings, he had to sacrifice a lot at an early age. He lost his father and

became the family breadwinner at the age of 12. He started a printing business at age

17 with a Php 3,000 loan from what is today known as the Development Bank of the

Philippines.

He never got to finish school even though he wanted to, because he was already

a full-fledged businessman by age 18. He’s gone through the ringer, so to speak: he’s

been a street vendor and at times slept on cardboard box on the sidewalks of the street.

The birth of Zest-O

Yao went from printing and packaging to the beverage industry in the unlikeliest
of ways. He learned printing wrappers through a cousin who was then working for a

printing press. This paved way for him to venture into the printing press business thus,

the birth of Solemar Commercial Press named after his mother.

In 1979, while on a business tour of Europe, he stumbled across a new way of

packaging: Doypack, a sealed bag made of plastic and aluminum that’s designed to

stand upright. Seeing its potential, he marketed it to local juice manufacturers, but no

one showed interest.

Not wanting to let something with this much potential go to waste, he started

making his own juices in his kitchen and packaged it using the doypacks he got from

Europe. He would soon corner the market on juice drinks, thanks to the convenience of

his doypacks.

The innovator

Yao has never been one to shy away from innovation. While his beverage

company, Zest-O Corporation, was slowly making waves in the juice market, he was

already looking at other potential investments. At 2008, he launched Zest Airways and

sought to compete with other low-cost carriers of the country.

He was met with stiff competition (Air Philippines and Cebu Pacific Air to name a

few), so he looked at a different way of flying people into the country. Thus, making Zest

Airways the first local carrier to fly tourists from China and Korea straight to Philippine

destinations, i.e. without dropping by NAIA. Last 2016, Zest Airways was fully integrated

with AirAsia as AirAsia Zest.

The Juice King Today

Alfredo Yao has gone a long way from his humble beginnings. He’s still at the

helm of Zest-O Group and Zest-O Corporation as its chairman but that didn’t stop him

from innovating and diversifying into other businesses.

Yao was also the Chairman of Macay Holdings, Inc., the parent company of ARC

Refreshments Corporation, which handles a couple of popular beverage brands

including RC Cola, and the founder and Chairman Emeritus of Philippine Business

Bank, a bank which focuses on small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and has over

139 branches as of 2016.

Some of the companies under the umbrella of the Yao Group of Companies were

Solmac Marketing, Inc., Harman Foods (Phils.), Inc., Amchem Marketing, Inc., Uni-Ipel

Industries, Inc., SMI Development, Inc., Summit Hotel and Resort Specialist,

Inc. (Former: Sol Marina Resort Boracay – Current: Movenpick Resort & Spa Boracay). 

With his determination to make something out of nothing, he was able to achieve

beyond what he could ever imagine. One important life lesson for Alfredo Yao is to just

work hard and never lose hope.

“Credibility is built, not given. Respect is earned, not bought” – Alfredo Yao

EDGAR “INJAP” SIA

 The country’s youngest billionaire at 40 years old, Injap Sia is the man behind

one of the country’s most popular food chains, Mang Inasal. Yes, it’s now under Jollibee

Foods Corporation, but the barbecued chicken they sell came from the mind of Injap

Sia, whose nickname comes from the lineage of his parents: Edgar Sia Sr. is half

Chinese or Instik, while his mother Paz is half Japanese.

Early days

A hard worker even at a young age, the Iloilo-born Injap was no stranger to doing

the legwork just to reach your goal. He took up Architecture at the University of San

Agustin in Iloilo City, but would later drop out at the age of 19 to start a laundry business

and open up his own photo-developing center.

2003 was the year when Injap came up with the grand idea of opening up a

chicken barbecue fast-food restaurant – an idea that was a bit of a novelty at the time.

His father, a Filipino-Chinese, gave him a hard time before eventually giving in.

The name

The name “Mang Inasal” was pretty straightforward: it’s Ilonggo for Mr. Barbecue.

His father, Edgar Sr., had other ideas. He wanted the name to be shorted to “Mng

Inasal”, citing feng shui and companies like Jollibee and Chowking. Both had eight

letters in their name, and both were successful in the fast food business.
 Injap nearly gave in to the suggestion until he came across Banco de Oro, which

had 10 letters and was just as successful as Jollibee and Chowking. Edgar Sr.

eventually gave in, and Mang Inasal was born at a mall in Iloilo City.

The deal

From that one branch, Mang Inasal ballooned to over a hundred in 2009. One

Manila-based company took notice and wanted in on the chicken barbecue craze:

Jollibee Foods Corporation and its owner, Tony Tan Caktiong.

Caktiong later acquired 70 percent of Mang Inasal’s stake for a whopping Php 3

billion in 2010. In April 2016, Jollibee acquired the remaining 30 percent to the tune of

Php 2 billion.

Two years after fully acquiring Mang Inasal, a partnership between Sia and

Caktiong was born: Double Dragon Properties, a real estate company that wants to

develop 100 community shopping complexes called City Malls in the smaller cities of

Visayas and Mindanao.

Diversify

That first Php 3 billion didn’t go to waste. Ever the eager businessman and

learner, Injap invested the money he got from Jollibee into banking (he was part of

Philippine Bank of Communication’s board for two and a half years), and health

maintenance (he still serves as a director for Maxicare, the country’s largest HMO).
 Today, he is the CEO of Injap Investments, Inc., which holds a joint venture in

Double Dragon Properties with Tony Tan Caktiong’s Honeystar Holdings Corporation.

He’s also the owner of People’s Hotel, a 5-storey businessman’s hotel in Iloilo City.

Injap Investments also owns Hotels of Asia, Inc., known for its line of Hotel101

condotels. They also acquired Deco’s La Paz Batchoy in 2007, the country’s oldest La

Paz batchoy restaurant in the country, and are located mostly in the Visayas region.

JOSE MAGSAYSAY

Potato Corner is a wholly-owned Filipino company that is now one of the most

successful local businesses that is also reaping success in other countries. It can be

found in all malls and the brand has gone from just kiosks to stand-up stores. Its

amazing success, like most other success stories, started with a leap of faith and has

gone on to establish it as one of the most profitable franchises in the country.

One of the original founders of Potato Corner, Jose Magsaysay, shared with

Business & Leisure the company’s humble beginnings over 20 years ago. It started

with four partners: Ricky Montelibano, Joe’s brother-in-law, and friends Danny Bermejo,

George Wieneke and their wives.

 Ricky was the first to start the flavored popcorn in the Philippines which became

a craze among young Pinoys. With only two flavors, barbecue and cheese, Ricky was

making so much money that he could afford a new car and a new cell phone back when

these were very new and very expensive in the country.

Jose, on the other hand, was working with Wendy’s, a modestly successful

foreign brand here, but he needed a “sideline” to earn more for his growing family. With

Ricky’s flavored popcorn business as model, the idea was born:  flavored fries.

The group needed to put up P150,000 as starting capital for Potato Corner. Joe

remembers that he didn’t have the money and had to scrounge around for P37,500, his

25 percent share in the business.  Like him, the other members of the group also had to

borrow to come up with their share of the total starting capital.

Meanwhile, Jose, who had been working with Wendy’s for nine years, was

confronted with a choice — it was Wendy’s or Potato Corner.  He couldn’t have both, so

Jsoe made his incredible leap of faith right there and then and left the safety of a stable

corporate job for the unknown.

That was in 1992, and they opened their first store in October of that same year.

It was a only a cart in Mandaluyong because, as Jose simply said, they couldn’t afford

anything bigger.  In just 30 days, Jose was able to pay back the P37,500 loan he got,

and so did the rest of the group. This was phenomenal success for their novel product

and the group saw the opportunities that were open to them.  That was the time to

expand, and franchising was certainly the most promising option they considered

seriously because, with very little funds at their disposal, franchising seemed to be their

only option to raise additional capital.

 At that time, franchising was a still a novel idea here, and the group did not have

the advantage of our current entrepreneurs who have the support of organized bodies

like our national franchising associations.  Jose knew about the mechanics of

franchising through his old job at Wendy’s, which is a local franchise.

Undaunted, he read books and researched on franchising. Armed with only the

basics of the mechanics of franchising, the group accepted their first franchisee, with a

franchise agreement that they copied on the net. Their first three franchises were closed

on mere handshakes, Jose recalls, and they had no manuals to go by to guide them.

Their gut feel for the business was so strong that they plunged into it without second

thoughts.

As things turned out, their franchise business grew faster than their company-

owned stores. This was because the group was bent on raising funds for their planned

expansion.  “It’s because of franchising that we were able to dominate the market,” Joe

said. 

Fast forward to 2006. There was an Indonesian student who studied here, got a

degree and eventually went back to his native country in 2003. Jose received a call from

him expressing his interest to bring Potato Corner’s flavored fries to Indonesia.  Jose

was not yet interested because they were still fully developing the local market. The

persistent student called again in 2004, in 2005 and finally in 2006 when Jose relented

and entertained the idea of bringing the brand to a foreign country. That same year,

they opened their first store in Indonesia. 

In 2010, they brought the brand to the United States.  It was also another student

whose father used to head the security of the Israeli Embassy here who was
instrumental in bringing Potato Corner to the land of French fries. The student who

studied at the International School and lived in a condo along Ayala Avenue used to

walk every day to Glorietta to buy from Potato Corner and wanted to bring it to the US. 

Joe and his group studied the market there and talked with a marketing guru in the US

who actually advised him against it, likening the prospect to selling ice cream to an ice

cream house. Their group, however, had more faith in his gut feel and went ahead with

Potato Corner’s invasion of the land of French fries.

Today, Potato Corner has over 100 stores in Indonesia, 45 stores in the United

States and several others in various countries.  Panama is one of these countries, and it

was incidentally also a foreign student studying at the Poveda who made the first step

here.  In all of these countries, Potato Corner was the first to offer flavored fries.

Starting with only a service crew of four, the enterprise now employs over 200

hundred in their corporate offices and company-owned stores. Some of them who have

been with the company when it started in 1992 continue to serve up to this day. The

company now sends the deserving ones to earn their masteral degrees in schools like

the Ateneo. Joe himself turned 55 in August of this year and decided to retire early.  It’s

time, he says for the company to take care of him now. Their company continues to

grow and they are looking forward to having 150 company-owned stores before the year

ends and more stores in other countries.  They are also looking forward to their 25th

anniversary in 2017.

His advice to would-be entrepreneurs?  “Consider franchising, and don’t wait until

the “fad”, the strong market acceptance fades.  If you have a good product, aim to
achieve market dominance at the soonest time, and continue to find ways to control the

business.”

DR. CECILIO K. DIOKNO

People thought Dr. Cecilio K. Pedro was crazy for going against big companies in

the toothpaste industry. Many years later, Hapee toothpaste remains as a major

competitor against global brands in the Philippines.

Cecilio Kwok Pedro, of Chinese descent, was born on 1953 in the Philippines.

Even when he was young, Pedro already has a knack for business, selling pens to his

schoolmates. Dr. Pedro’s story is not the rags-to-riches type, but his success is

nevertheless admirable.

He graduated from Ateneo de Manila with a degree in Business Management. It

was around 1975 when Cecilio to put up his own business. He borrowed P20,000 from

his father and founded Aluminum Containers, Inc., supplying collapsible aluminum

toothpaste tubes to Colgate-Palmolive, Procter & Gamble, and Philippine Refining

Company. But due to environmental concerns, the companies decided to use plastic-

laminated toothpaste tubes instead in 1985. Cecilio’s company took a huge blow,

prompting him to close his business in the same year.

 Dr. Cecilio did not allow this problem to put him down. In 1985, he decided to

start again and established Lamoiyan Corporation.  Lamoiyan was the Cantonese name

of her grandmother, whom he loved and look up to. It was her that introduced their

family to Christianity.

The initial plan was to use the machines from his defunct company for epoxy but

he thought that the market was too small. Since he used to be a supplier for a

toothpaste company, this is where he focused the business instead, much to the

disapproval of many. He developed his own brand of toothpaste, Hapee. Contending

against well-known, international brands is a tough one, so Dr. Pedro realized that the

only way that his toothpaste can get noticed is to sell them at a lower price, 50% less

that of Colgate and Close up. The company also developed different fruity flavors of

Hapee which enticed the children. They also manufactured the toothpaste in smaller

packs and sachets; hence, catering to different markets.

It was they took Lea Salonga as their first celebrity endorser to further improve

brand awareness. Hapee was getting 15% of the market already and getting a famous

endorser increased it. In later years they also introduced other variety of products like

dishwashing pastes and fabric detergents.

Not only is Lamoiyan Corporation known for creating a Filipino brand of

toothpaste, but also for its commitment to supporting the  deaf community. The

company employed hearing-impaired people, and required employees to learn how to

communicate with the deaf. And since he is a devout Christian like her grandmother, Dr.

Cecilio Diokno also founded and chaired the Deaf Evangelistic Alliance Foundation

(DEAF) which gave scholarship to the deaf community and introduced them to
Christianity, standing by the company’s motto, “To make a difference for the glory of

God.”

CORAZON D. ONG

Unrelenting passion and the need for financial betterment, is what drove the

young Corazon D. Ong to establish his business empire. With the right amount of

knowledge, skills, and liking for what she does, Corazon rose from a simple homemaker

to a very successful businesswoman. Let us look at how she managed to flip the tables

around!

Corazon D. Ong, was a simple homemaker then; a good wife to his husband

Jose who is a professor at the very prestigious Ateneo de Manila University, and a

loving mother to his three kids – Jerome, Jason & Sharmaine. Aside from that, she is

also a licensed dietician. So, what she did then, as part of her daily routine is to prepare

food for the fami8ly. Being a dietician, she keeps in mind the significance of a balanced

healthy meal to the body, so to make sure that her family will be getting the best meals,

she prepares them herself. Little did she knew, that this hobby of her will be the root of

their success.

As mentioned, the production of food started out as a hobby. She prepares them

tocino, longganisa, and other easy-to-make processed food. It was initially for the family
only, but she noticed that many moms in their neighborhood also likes these products,

she started to sell out. She saw the need of these moms to prepare a quick-fix yet

healthy lunch for their kids, so to help them she started retailing small amounts of these

products. It was highly praised, and Corazon received a lot of positive feedbacks. So,

what she did was, borrow from a local bank a total amount of P60, 000 to put up an

official business. It was in June 25, 1975 when she established CDO Food Products at

the backyard of their humble home. The first product they released was longganisa and

tocino among others.

In 1981, Foodsphere Inc. was duly registered and CDO was retained as the

flagship name of its food products. Innovations and modernizations followed to ran after

the growing industry. The company was converted into a family corporation. Her whole

family worked together to make the business more successful. However, tragedies

cannot be avoided. It was in 1987 when a fire broke out in the company’s processing

area, destroying most of their advanced processing equipments. It was one of the

incidents that really challenged the faith and dedication of Corazon. But she stood

above it, nevertheless. Two days after the fire, Corazon called her staff to plan about

what they will be doing next. Because of that, CDO Foodsphere Inc., was again back on

its feet to serve the Filipino people.

Bouncing back from that, CDO became even more eager to expand their

products horizon. From then on, different innovations of products were continuously

being researched to satisfy the palates of the consumers especially Filipinos. From

Longanizas to tocino, hotdogs and many others, the company tried to develop more and

more products to cater the masses based on their consumption. In 2001, the company
introduced carne norte which suited the Filipino taste at a very reasonable price and

another innovation in the industry. CDO-Foodsphere has emerged as the number one

producer of carne norte in the land. She was also the brain behind the San Marino

Corned Tuna, which is now a hit in the market. CDO Foodsphere has established its

success based on the needs of the consumers. Ong’s core vision came to reality that is

to provide affordable food products to the most number of Filipino households.

Looking back, who would have thought that a simple desire to give the best

meals to the family would became a very profitable and successful business? Yes,

CDO’s Corazon really proved that there is more to being a simple homemaker. Because

of her successes, he has received a lot of awards in her field of interest. These are:

Most Outstanding Nutritionist of the Year in 1996, Agora Awardee for the Most

Outstanding Medium-Scale Entrepreneur in 1997, Most Outstanding Professional in the

Field of Dietetics in 1999, Most Outstanding Woman in Valenzuela in 2006, and Woman

Entrepreneur Award in 2009. But above all these achievements, her most satisfying

award is the way he has brought up their children.

Her son Jerome is now the corporate Vice-President who has a degree in

Economics from the University of the Philippines; Jason, is now a nutritionist and head

of the research department; and their only daughter, Sharmaine, a licensed physician

but joined the family business as the one handling the financial aspect. This is what she

considers her life’s best blessings.

INTERNATIONAL SUCCESSFUL ENTREPRENEURS

DO WON CHANG
 Do Won Chang (nicknamed Don) is the founder of Forever 21, a store that was

started in the United States of America and has branches all over the world and turns

over billions in sales every year. He, together with his wife, is worth $6.3 million, listed

as #248 worldwide by Forbes.

Do Won Chang was born in a village called Myeong-Dong in Seoul, South Korea

in 1954. His strong work ethic was in him from an early age. When he was old enough,

he worked in coffee shops and started his own coffee delivery service.

In 1981, Don Chang moved to America with his wife, Jin Sook. At one point, he

had to work three jobs. He worked in coffee shops; he worked as a janitor and as a gas

station attendant.

However, once he had lived in the states for a while, he discovered that fashion

would be his ticket to success. He noticed that all the wealthy people around him

worked in fashion.

In 1984, using the wages from his three jobs, Do Wan Chang was able to open

his first store in the Highland Park area of Los Angeles. He called it Fashion 21 and

targeted it towards his fellow Korean-Americans. In just the first year, sales soared from

$35,000 to $700,000. However, as the business took off, he wanted to broaden the

demographics of his customers.

 Chang changed the name of his store to Forever 21 to appeal to more

customers. This clearly worked as he was then able to open more stores in the United

States and even in his hometown, Myeong-Dong back in South Korea. Within five

years, he had opened eleven stores.

2009 was a very tough year for everyone, including businesses, as we all know,

due to the recession. Chang was forced to make a few cuts and close seven stores.

However, you can’t keep a man with his tenacity down for long.

Forever 21 soon recovered and has continued to grow and grow. It now has over

600 stores around the world, including one in Birmingham and one in London, UK.

Forever 21 have faced many lawsuits in recent years over alleged copyright

infringement in their garments from designers such as Gwen Stefani and Diane Von

Furstenberg. However, the family has never been found liable for copyright

infringement. In fact, when they started selling cheap versions of accessory designer of

the year Alexis Bittar’s jewelry, he was very excited and took it is as a compliment that

someone thought his designs were good enough to copy.

JAN KOUM

Jan Koum born on February 24, 1976 is an American internet inventor and
computer programmer. He is the CEO and co-founder of WhatsApp with Brian

Acton.Brian Acton born on February 17, 1972 is an American computer programmer

and Internet entrepreneur and co-founder of Whatsapp with Jan koum, a mobile

messaging application which was acquired by Facebook Inc. in February 2014 for

US$19 billion. He was formerly employed at Yahoo.

Jan Koum childhood 

A billionaire today, he is counted amongst the richest Americans but just a few

years ago he was so poor that he had to live off food stamps. Born into a humble family

in Ukraine, he migrated to the United States as a teenager with his mother and

grandmother.

His initial years in the new country were very difficult; the family struggled to

make ends meet. Their situation worsened when his mother became ill with cancer and

eventually passed away. A resilient soul, Jan Koum worked his way through high

school, and found a job at Yahoo as an infrastructure engineer, while still attending

college.

Jan koum and Brian Acton

Jan formed a rapport with Brian Acton, another Yahoo employee with who he

would form a long-term collaboration in future. After working at Yahoo for several years,

both Koum and Acton left the job to explore newer avenues in social media.

Their love for social media ultimately led the two men to form WhatsApp as a

mobile messaging application which went on to become the most popular messaging

platform in the world.

In 1998, Jan was hired by Yahoo as an infrastructure engineer. Shortly afterward

he met Acton while working at young as a security tester. Over the next nine years, they

worked at Yahoo. Acton invested in the dotcom boom and lost millions in the dot-com

bubble of 2000.

In September 2007 Koum and Acton left Yahoo and took a year off, traveling

around South America and playing Frisbee. Both applied, and failed, to work at

Facebook. In January 2009, Koum bought an iphone and realized that the then seven-

month-old App Store was about to spawn a whole new industry of apps.

He visited his friend Alex Fishman and talked about developing an app. Koum

almost immediately chose the name WhatsApp because it sounded like “what’s up,” and

a week later on his birthday Feb. 24, 2009, he incorporated WhatsApp Inc. in California.

Thus,Jan and brian Acton successfully launched whatsapp without any ads and

their main goal is customer satisfaction. And currently Jan Koum net worth is 9.6 billion

USD.

“I want to do one thing, and DO IT WELL.” - Jan Koum

HENRY FORD

Ford Motor Company was founded by the late Henry Ford in 1903. A century

after the company withstood wars, depression and competition. It is the fifth largest
company to date based on worldwide car sales. But just like most businesses, Ford

started small. The company had to overcome a lot of struggles and pass several stages

and changes in its history.

Henry Ford left home at an early age and worked as an apprentice in some

automotive companies until he decided to have one of his own. He founded the Detroit

Automobile Company in 1899 and renamed as the Henry Ford Company in 1901. As

cases with most starters, he encountered financial difficulties and had to leave the

company.

Leaving the company paved the way to his success. As Ford once said, “Failure

is simply the opportunity to begin again, this time more intelligently.” Living with

this principle, he tried again and founded what we now know as Ford Motor Company.

He also introduced the then unheard of ‘assembly line’ for his car manufacturing and

changed the game for the car industry.

Cars at that time were limited to people of wealth. Though transportation was a

daily cadence by people from all walks of life, it was considered an expensive toy for the

rich. Car production was still in its infanthood, and production costs were sky high.

Thus, owning a car was exclusive for the rich. Until Ford’s assembly line.

Henry Ford founded Ford Motor Company with the vision of making quality cars

generally available and affordable for the majority. This American dream was not as

easy as it sounded. The company started producing automobiles the traditional way, but

with the time it was taking to finish a unit along with the materials needed, they had no

choice but to compensate these expenses towards the price of their cars. Each

automobile needed roughly 12 hours to complete which was costing the company labor
and time.

So, Ford started another approach on making cars. He identified stages or steps

to creating a unit. Then, he disseminated his workers to specialize on a certain stage.

And using a machine similar to a conveyor belt, the cars were moved from one stage to

another until all parts were placed. This method significantly decreased labor from the

traditional 12-hour period down to 2 hours and 30 minutes. The system decreased the

costs and so the car price. Model T, their most popular car unit, had its price reduced

from $850 to $290.

This new system totally changed the game of automobile industry, from cars

being a luxury item exclusive for the rich to being an affordable necessity available for

everyone. Ford Motors sales skyrocketed until they were supplying 50% of all cars in

the US. But, contrary to the positive reaction of the consumers, other car companies’

sales plummeted to rock bottom.

When Ford implemented the new system, the entire car industry was indignant at

Ford for changing the eco-system of the industry. When the Great Depression struck

America, 183 out of 200 automobile companies declared bankruptcy. Other car

companies knew they had to do something to survive. GM went to the route of creating

more personalized cars, Chrysler and Chevrolet started manufacturing automobiles with

more creative features while others looked for better ways of assembling cars. Ford

survived the Depression.

Introducing new ways of doing things will always create a ripple in the pond.

When things are doing great, everyone is adamant to change, no matter how sensible

and better it is. It takes a brave and obstinate individual, with a will of steel to disturb an
orderly setup. Early on, the game-changer is always looked upon as a dissident, an

annoying disturbance, a newbie about to fail. It is later, when the system is adapted and

accepted, that many will recognize it as an innovation and a legacy, and the game-

changer a brilliant trendsetter and leader.

Ford Motor Company is history itself. It has experienced successes and failures,

but through the collective effort of all the people behind it, the company has survived

even the greatest war. Along with it, they’ve learned to be innovative, versatile and

adaptable to the changes of the world. These have made Ford the mighty company we

now see 103 years after it was founded in 1903.

MARK ZUCKERBERG

Mark Zuckerberg was born on May 14, 1984, and grew up in nearby Dobbs

Ferry. His parents, Edward Zuckerberg, is a dentist, and his mother, Karen Zuckerberg,

is a psychiatrist. Mark got interested in computer programming at an early stage. His

father taught him Atari Basic and then hired developer David Newman to give his son

lessons.

Mark Zuckerberg created a messaging program which he called “Zucknet.” He

implemented inter-office communication, which allowed computers to connect and

transfer messages between house and dental office. The messenger communicates by

Ping, which is the primitive version of AOL’s instant messenger.

Mark also enjoyed developing games and communication tools such as the

computer version of Monopoly. Being at high school for his senior project at Exeter,

Zuckerberg wrote an artificially intelligent music player called the Synapse that carefully

studied the user’s listening habits and recommended other music. He posted it online,

Microsoft, AOL wanted to acquire it, but he turned them down and enrolled at Harvard

University in September 2002.

Mark studied computer science at Harvard University. He had gained the best

reputation as a programming prodigy. Then he wrote a program that he called

CourseMatch, which helped the students to make class selection decisions on the basis

of lists of courses from other users and also to help them form study groups. He also

invented Facemash, which aims to find out the most attractive person on the campus.

He wrote a program that randomly selected two pictures of the people and put them

next to each other. The visitors of the site choose “who is hotter”? The software

compiled and ranked the result. It was an astounding success, but the college shut it

down because its popularity bogged down the network at Harward; many students

complained that their pictures were used without their permission; it was offensive to

people on campus. Zuckerberg ended the project and apologized publicly.

Zuckerberg partnered with friends to create a social networking site that brings

social experience to the internet. They wanted to create an environment where college

students can share photos, links, and other personnel information. Zuckerberg’s friends

at Harvard included Chris Huges, Billy Olson, Dustin Moskovitz, the conversation that
occurred among them enhanced ideas. The task of Mark Zuckerberg includes creating

the best source code which allows the system to work.

February 04, 2004, Mark Zuckerberg registered the domain Thefacebook.com,

which is known as Facebook.com. However, an application is intended to function only

within Harvard. Zuckerberg and his friend Dustin Moskovitz realized that there were

already many registered users on Facebook, and they decided to spread it to other

schools at Yale, Stanford, Columbia University, New York University, University of

Pennsylvania. Zuckerberg and some other friends moved to Palo Alto, California, in

Silicon Valley, where they set up a small office. After that, Mark met with Peter Thiel,

who agreed to invest in the company. They also turned down offers by major

corporations. For Mark Zuckerberg and his friends, the most important thing is to create

free flow information for people.

STEVE JOBS

Steve Jobs need no introduction, as even the kids around us are very well aware

of this guy. He was more than just the co-Founder of Apple Computer and the brain

behind the reinvention of companies like Pixar Animation Studios. Steve Jobs has
always been a creative genius who pioneered the transformation of the computer

industry and came forward to introduce revolutionary products like iMac.

Just like most other heroes, the journey of Steve Jobs also had a fair share of

hardships and downfalls. Steve Jobs stood up through every rise and fall, taking it as an

opportunity to turn things around and move the industry that he created, towards a

better future.

Right from the start, Steve Jobs was a very special guy who was a born genius.

Almost immediately after his birth, his biological parents, Abdul Fattah Jandali and

Joanne Carole Schieble, unaware of the wonder they had made, gave him up for

adoption.

Soon, Paul and Clara Jobs, a working-class couple adopted the baby. From a

very young age, Steve Jobs was seen fascinated by the power and intricacy of

computers. What kick-started his love for machines was from his mechanic father’s

family garage, where he worked by taking apart cars and putting them back together.

His father taught him to pay attention to detail, which Jobs set as a mantra for Apple

that has helped to set it apart from the competitors.

At school, Steve Jobs was a genius who at the age of 12 called HP founder Bill

Hewlett in order to ask for some electronic parts for a school project. Hewlett was so

impressed by Jobs that he offered him a summer internship, where he met Steve

Wozniak.

Growing up, he never enjoyed school, and ended up dropping out of college after

the first semester but continued to attend the classes that interested him. One of the

classes he was interested in was calligraphy, which led to his love for typography.
Soon, Steve Jobs started to work at Atari as a video game designer and then visited

Indi, in order to find spiritual enlightenment.

Steve Jobs started a partnership with Steve Wozniak that proved to be

outstanding. They started up with the ‘Blue Box’, which is a wireless system that could

be used for free to make long-distance calls. This slowly led to the start of the first-ever

Apple Machine.

After relentless efforts and chasing behind investors to fund them. Apple was

started with a big bang that made the news headlines.

He was one of the youngest people who was included on the Forbes list of the

richest people in the country- a great achievement that he made without any inherited

family wealth.

His life gave him a push that made him fall when he was fired from the Macintosh

Group. But the departure was an establishment to the new beginnings of his fame. He

stood up being strong and went on establishing his new company, NeXT Computer Co.

After many ups and downs, Jobs set a classic example of attempting relentless efforts

to reinvent oneself in order to succeed.

Later, NeXT merged up with Apple to give us the iOS that we use today. But this

didn’t satisfy Jobs as he always wanted to build a big empire. He invested in a startup

that was called Graphics Group, now known as Pixar.

Steve Jobs was successful enough to revive the company and bring it back in the

same successful phase as it had in the 70s. His vision of relentless innovation made

Apple a huge success.

 With Jobs return to Apple, he introduced several feats, that include the iMac and

the installation of the G3 PowerPC microprocessor. Apple launched devices like the

iPod, iPhone, and iPad that shaped and changed the lives of millions across the world.

Everything was back to normal and going perfectly well. But unexpectedly, what utterly

shocked the world when he was diagnosed with a rare form of cancer of the pancreas.

Jobs declined to see and obtain any medical care from a doctor. Instead, he turned to

natural techniques such as dependence on herbal juices, vegan diets, that he felt would

cure his disease. But his plans backfired, fatally worsening his health.

He resigned from Apple after a few years when Jobs could no longer work

normally. He continued to work at Apple and died calmly, surrounded by family, six

weeks after his last day of work.

Although the life of Steve Jobs was short, his legacy still continues. His life is an

example for millions that how failure can bring new opportunities in life and how to

restructure the failure into a success story.

BILL GATES

Bill Gates is the co-founder of Microsoft Corporation and one of the world’s most

prominent individuals, who was born in Seattle, Washington, on October 28, 1955. Bill
Gates is one of the most inspiring figures in history, he has had a life packed with

achievements. Have a look here and you will find everything that you’ve ever wanted to

know about Bill Gates’ life and achievements!

Bill Gates is an American programmer, entrepreneur, investor and philanthropist,

co-founder of Microsoft: the premier software company in the world. With an estimated

$90.6 billion in net worth, Gates is the world’s, second-richest man. But how did he

shaped this wealth, and how did he tackle the obstacles to get there?

Bill Gates’ Early Life

Well, the guy comes from a fairly wealthy background so he doesn’t have a story

that rags-to-rich one. Bill Gates had to work hard in order to become what he is today.

His father was a prosperous attorney, while his mother was a school teacher who

became a member of the First Interstate Bank Board of Directors. Gates was a brilliant

student who performed exceptionally well in academics, especially in the subject,

Mathematics.

At the early age of 13, a passion for computers and programming was developed

by Bill Gates. He also got himself enrolled into a private preparatory school, the

Lakeside School at the same age. While at school, seeing Gates’ flare in programming,

the school administration decided to buy him a computer from the General Electric

Company. The school administration allowed him to pursue his interest by excusing him

from classes. Bill Gates, on the GEC machine, built his first ever computer program.

While at school, Bill Gates along with Paul Allen worked together in a system that

belonged to Computer Center Corporation, to find bugs in it. Gates and Allen together

with two other students wrote a payroll program for Information Sciences in exchange
for computer time and royalties. This led the school to become fully aware of Gates’

talent.

In the early age, Gates and Allen continued to build software’s and Bill Gates

sold software to optimize traffic for $20,000 in the age of 15. He developed another

software, a few years later and earned $30,000 from it. And with this, he started his

journey on the way to becoming a successful billionaire.

Setting up Microsoft Corporation

Bill Gates and Paul Allen, in 1975, co-founded a software company that was

named as Micro-Soft. In the initial stage, the company was delivering small software

products to different firms as they were not able to hire a sales manager. This process

was done by Gates’ mother, Mary Maxwell.

Shortly thereafter, the company started to face financial crises that made Gates

and Allen realize that Microsoft had dropped to the lowest affordable point. The issue

was occurring mainly due to the usage of some pirated software. However, the two

owners had the courage not to lose hope and as “Struggling is a Part of the Story”, both

of them came up with the launch of MS-BASIC, which helped them in making a profit of

$50,000.

In 1979, Microsoft was offered to develop a program by one of the American

multinational tech company – IBM who launched (about to launch at that moment) the

world’s first personal computer. Unfortunately, at that time, Microsoft didn’t have the

resources to develop an Operating Software (OS), so it recommended another

company to IBM for its OS.

 Soon after a few months, an OS system named ’86-DOS’ was bought by

Microsoft and started to enhance it regularly on a wide scale that resulted in the launch

of ‘MS-DOS’. Directly after the launch, Microsoft offered IBM to use MS-DOS for their

first-ever personal computer that they were about to launch as the key OS. IBM

accepted the proposal immediately and Microsoft was able to see-off Digital Research

competition-the company Gates and Allen had suggested IBM for developing their OS.

A contract between Microsoft and IBM was signed in 1980 and Microsoft became

Microsoft Corporation within a year.

The first-ever personal computer was launched by IBM with MS-DOS along with

other Microsoft products like MS-BASIC, MS-COBOL, MS-PASCAL, etc. The company

founded by Bill Gates started to pour accomplishments which included the creation of

the first mouse for personal computer, and development of the Windows Operating

System.

The first Windows OS that got launched was Windows NT, then over the next

few years, a series of Windows were followed, including the launch of Window 95,

Windows 98, Windows 2000, XP, and Vista. Ever since Microsoft has been growing.

Microsoft has expanded its product from Window OS, Microsoft Office Suites, Office

365, Xbox, Bing, and Hotmail, it goes on.

Currently

Everything began with the first idea, Microsoft is keeping on dominating the

software market. Bill Gates has been successful in keeping up with the pace of change,

which led Microsoft to remain #1 software company in the world.

 For a few years now, there has been no involvement of Gates in the day-to-day

operations of Microsoft. Most of the time has been dedicated to philanthropy and

community projects. He has co-founded many foundations; one of them is The Giving

Pledge, which is a foundation that focuses on encouraging wealthy people to contribute

their majority of wealth towards Philanthropic Causes. More than 80 per cent of Bill

Gates’ wealth is pledged to the charity upon death.

JEFF BEZOS

Jeff Bezos, the founder and CEO of Amazon is the richest person in the world

with a net worth of $179.6 billion. Additionally, he also owns a rocket company ‘Blue

Origin’ and ‘Washington Post’ newspaper. The road to success for Jeff Bezos wasn’t

butterflies and rainbows.

An early life of Jeff Bezos

Jeff was born in Mexico to a teenager mother, Jacklyn and father Ted Jorgense.

The marriage just continued for over a year. She later remarried to Miguel Bezos in

1968. Jeff was 4 years old at that time. As Jeff grew up he had developed an interest in

computer science. After completing his graduation, he got offers from Intel and Bell

labs. Jeff denied them all. He joined a startup- Fitel but later decided to quit and join

Bankers Trust. By the age of 30, Jeff Bezos was already drawing a six figure salary.
Many would call him a successful person but he had other plans. One day while surfing

through the internet, he found that the world of web is growing by 2300%. Moving out of

his comfort zone, he left his lucrative job at DE Shaw and Company and started his own

company.

Why is Amazon so successful?

The determination that went into accomplishing this dream is momentous.

Amazon came into existence through ceaseless and constant quest for building a

quality organization. Amazon was built on the pillars of strength of character, single

minded focus and a will to provide the highest consumer experience to every person

associated with the company.

Jeff Bezos went onto to build a web retailing system while the world was still

wondering how an internet can function. The key focus for Amazon has never been to

defeat competitors. Rather it focuses on helping consumers and building a value for

them. This keeps them engrossed in implementing their plans and policies.

What are Jeff Bezos’s failures?

There are many ventures that Jeff experimented and initiated which failed

terribly. But that’s the culture of growth.  If you aren’t failing and making mistakes, you

aren’t doing anything important.

Fire phone is one such example of Bezos’s experiment. This project resulted in a

loss of $170 million. Despite all efforts, the fire phone couldn’t compete Android and

Iphone. Other major failure was Amazon Local. This was an initiative to provide a daily

deal which did not come off well. Others in the list are Amazon wallet, Amazon local
registers, Music importer, Test Drive, Amazon WebPay, Endless.com, Askville and

many more.

Bezos says that experiments that do work out such as Amazon Kindle, Amazon Prime,

AWS and others are so successful that they pay for failures.

Invention is the crux

The key focus for Amazon has never been to defeat its competitors. Rather it

focuses on helping consumers and building value for them. This keeps them engrossed

in implementing their plans and policies. Under Jeff’s thought leadership, the group

employed over 1.3 million talented and dedicated individuals while keeping invention as

its core focus.

With the onset of February 2021, Bezos declared that he will be stepping down

as the CEO of Amazon soon to ensure an adamant focus on other projects. It has been

estimated that Amazon’s Web Services head Andy Jassy will be taking the charge as

the CEO. Addressing his employees across the globe through a heartwarming email,

Jeff revealed his plan to develop a brand new product line while putting his full

confidence in Andy’s future leadership roles.

Jeff’s career trajectory illustrates that an idea will always remain an idea until you

try that out. It may fail. It may succeed. But if it succeeds, who knows, anyone can be on

the pinnacle of success.

DHIRUBHAI AMBANI
 Perusing examples of overcoming adversity of most prominent experts animates

persuasive chemicals inside us and us as a whole wish to imitate them on the way of

achievement.

Genuine poverty to newfound wealth story, Dhirajlal Hirachand Ambani, has

been undisputedly India’s most venturesome business visionary. Conceived in a

Gujarati family Dhirubhai moved to Yemen at 16 years old, where he filled in as a

dispatch representative with A. Besse and Co.

Subsequent to working in Dubai for quite a while he later came back to India

where he established the Reliance Commercial Corporation with a small capital of Rs.

15000. He set up the business in association with Champaklal Damani from whom he

split in 1965.

Dhirubhai Ambani began his first material plant at Naroda, close Ahmedabad,

and propelled the brand “Vimal”. He later expanded into petrochemicals and divisions

like Telecommunications, Information Technology, Energy, Power, Retail, Textiles,

Capital Markets, and Logistics.

He rose from humble beginnings to make India’s biggest mechanical realm, and

all the while, got one of the world’s most extravagant men. He revised India’s corporate
history for which he was included among the select Forbes extremely rich people list.

He likewise figured in the Sunday Times rundown of the top 50 specialists in Asia.

Credited for beginning the value religion in India, Dhirubhai Ambani was adulated for

his key job in molding India’s securities exchange culture by pulling in swarms of retail

speculators to a market hoarded by state-run monetary organizations.

He never followed the customary way and was regularly focused on his business

procedures because of which he sought discussion all for a mind-blowing duration. The

‘Dhirubhai school of the board’ immovably accepted that the main things which made a

difference were the final products and the advantages which penetrated legitimately to

the investors.

He won numerous honors and awards during his lifetime. In 2000, he was given

the ‘Man of the Century’ grant by Chemtech Foundation and Chemical Engineering

World for his commitment to the development and advancement of the substance

business in India. In 1998, he was granted the Dean’s Medal by The Wharton School,

University of Pennsylvania, for setting an extraordinary case of the initiative. Dhirubhai

Ambani was likewise named the “Man of the twentieth century” by the Federation of

Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI).

An ideal amalgamation of coarseness and assurance, Dhirubhai had faith in his

fantasies and he lived it. He was of the conviction “Dhirubhai will go one day. Be that as

it may, Reliance’s workers and investors will keep it above water. Dependence is

currently an idea in which the Ambanis have gotten unessential.”

In 1986 after an extreme heatstroke he gave over Reliance Group to his children

Mukesh and Anil. After his demise, the epic corporate gathering was part into Reliance
Industries, headed by Mukesh Ambani and Reliance Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group

(ADAG), drove by Anil Ambani.

A visionary by birth, his life has been a motivation for some and will fill in as a

reference point light for the ages to come.

Learning You Can Gain From Dhirubhai Ambani:

 Always think of how to be revolutionary

 Think big, start small

 You can learn the most from the risks you take

 Bet on the people around you

 Do not worry about change

 Create a niche for yourself

LARRY ELLISON

Larry Ellison, the founder and former head of Oracle Corporation, is well-known

for his extravagant entertainments, rather than talented company management. He’s

one of the best examples of a self-made entrepreneur (net worth of $64.9 billion). Today

we’ll find out how one of the most contradictory managers built his empire.

Personality Formation
 It’s essential to say some words about Larry’s childhood because it was the time

of his personality formation.

Larry was a problem child. He spent his childhood in a two-room apartment in

southern Chicago. Larry’s adoptive father, Louis, was an ex-pat from the Crimea. He

took the name Ellison to hide his Jewish origin. Louis was a modest civil servant, who

made a fortune on real estate in Chicago and lost it during the Great Depression.

Larry was an independent adolescent, which often led to ‘civil wars’ between him

and his adoptive father. Louis was a problem person as his son. “You will never achieve

anything, damn loser,” – the father was looking at Larry in dismay. “There is no bullshit

in the newspapers about successful guys. They do not fail comrades. And they don’t

break their noses as silly as you!”

Larry didn’t use to be a fool at all. In truth, he was considering himself smarter

than all his classmates and hesitating to declare this. He was interested in things that

were happening outside the school as lessons were too dull for him.

After graduating from the school, Larry entered the University of Illinois. The

future began to seem cloudless, student life was dragging him headlong, and it was

easy to study. Unfortunately, his adoptive mother dies during the final exams and he

gives up the university.

Having sunk to the bottom, the real Larry gropes it, pushes away, and receives a

new impetus for upward movement. Searching for the meaning of life and looking

around with an empty look, Ellison suddenly finds a new passion – computers, and

programming.

Tech Interest
 Larry first became interested in the subject magazines. Then he began to attend

parties, where the same newbies like him were gathering. Larry dived into the sphere

very quickly unlike the others. Giant iron boxes and sets of punch cards turned out to be

Larry’s most faithful friends. After a few months, he realized that he was able to develop

simple programs much better than the others.

Larry quickly moved to sunny California, where he made his first career steps. He

was developing custom programs and began to earn pretty good money. Nevertheless,

Ellison was completely unable to save.

A difficult economic situation didn’t break him. Larry was a dreamer and

visionary. He knew that the future was behind computers and the first one who would

learn how to deal with them would be the king.

Oracle Development

In the early 70s, Ellison was working for a small company – Amtex. When he

joined it, he already knew how to develop powerful databases that process various

types of payments and almost all banking operations.

That was the time when Larry developed Oracle. It was a convenient, multi-

functional, and almost perfect database. It was a huge live mechanism that could

process an enormous amount of requests and was served at an intuitive level. There

were no impossible tasks for it. Oracle could do everything.

This software was too good to be sold. In 1977, Larry Ellison and the former

Amtex CEO Robert Miner founded their own company, called Oracle. The oracle is the

one who gives correct answers to all the questions.

 Larry believed that computers were the future. Nevertheless, he thought that

these machines should belong to large corporations, no to individuals. His vision of the

Tech future was quite different from Bill Gates and Paul Allen.

Oracle is a DBMS (database management system). It’s used for the distributed

data storage: customer lists, equipment data, employee credentials, financial records,

transaction history, correspondence, legal documents, and much more.

Ellison was roughly explaining the same thing to his first customers. His software

could do breathtaking things: for example, select one store from a supermarket chain

that works better than others, determine the most demanded cheese in Florida in April,

etc. Oracle was able to process a bunch of different data, and therefore the first

customers were the CIA and the US Air Force.

WALT DISNEY

Not every hero born with a silver spoon, there are years of struggle, uncountable

failures, and exhausting hardships, Every successful person have a story, a tragedy that

he or she might have faced, it didn’t matter what the tragedy was – could have been

their childhood, health, parents, debts –they had a compelling reason to get out of that

situation, finding a way to get out of a situation that’s the start where change begins.
Walt Disney the man behind famous cartoon character ‘mickey mouse’, creator of the

first full length animated movie ‘snow white and the seven dwarfs’, the originator of the

modern multimedia corporation, the inventor of the theme park Disney land and Walt

Disney world and author of the most famous children stories, had a hard time on his

way to being billionaire, through most of his carrier he encountered failures and faced

financial crisis.

Disney was born in Chicago in 1901, his family wasn’t well-off, he had three

brothers and a younger sister, Disney and his brothers worked as paper boys and didn’t

have much time for school,initially Disney became interested in drawing and started

selling his drawing in the neighborhood, during the first world war when Disney was only

16 years old – dropped out from school to join the army, but unfortunately he was

rejected for being too young,later Walt joined red cross and sent overseas, there he

drove ambulance for a year, after the war, Walt returned and decided to start started his

career as a newspaper artist and got a job in Pesmen-Rubin art studio, there he met

fellow cartoonist and lifelong friend Ubbe Iwerks, later he was fired by his editor the

justification being, “ he had no good ideas and lacked imagination,” but this didn’t

discouraged Disney.

“All of my obstacles have strengthen me, you may not realize it when it happens, but

the kick in the teeth may be the best thing in the world for you – Walt Disney”

Disney started his very first business ‘Iwerks-Disney commercial artists’ with his

new friend Ub, unfortunately they were not able to attract much customers and the

business went into failure in just a month, he again started his second business, this

time his company went bankrupt, even he went bankrupt five times before he found
success with Disney land, at one time he was so poor that he only survived on dog

food.

Initial failures sent Disney to Hollywood, here he started working with his older

brother, together they created ‘Disney brothers studio’ and came up with a character

‘mickey mouse’, the character first appeared in two silent films, Plane Crazy and the

GallopinGauchi, initially the character was rejected by the audience but Disney was

used to failures, Disney and his time integrated synchronized sound and came up with a

third short film ‘Steamboat Willie’, it became an instant success the reviews were

beyond imagination.

“It’s a kind of fun to do the impossible – Walt Disney”

6 years and many successful animations latter Disney decided to create a full

length animated movie, he risked all he had, while the production of movie, he ran out of

funding and borrowed $1.5million for unprecedented budget, even his wife and brother

was thinking that this is all just madness, nobody is going to sit through a full length

cartoon movie, but he ignored all the ridicule and remained focused on his work, he

spent three years in the creation of movie- the results was a huge success, the film

became the most successful motion picture of the year.

Disney’s life teaches a lesson that our accomplishments solely  depends on our

willingness and not-giving spirit, if you can dream it, you can do it, he won 22 academy

awards, more than anyone else in the history.

“All of our dreams can come true, if we have the courage to pursue them – Disney”

Reference/s:
 Success Story: Henry Sy Sr., Philippines’ Richest Man. Primer. https://primer.co

m.ph/business/2015/12/27/success-story-henry-sy-sr/

 Success Story: Tony Tan Caktiong of Jollibee Group. Primer. https://primer.com.

ph/business/2017/03/07/success-story-tony-tan-caktiong-of-jollibee-group/

 Success Story of Lucio Tan. http://michaelyana.blogspot.com/2011/12/lucio-tan-

successful-story.html

 Buarao, J. (2020). Socorro Ramos: National Book Stores Matriarch’s Success

Story. https://josephbuarao.com/blog/socorro-ramos-national-book-stores-matria

rchs-success-story/

 Story of Filipino Success: Mariano Que, founder of Mercury Drug. Primer.

https://primer.com.ph/business/2017/04/21/story-of-filipino-success-mariano-que-

founder-of-mercury-drug/

 Success Story of Alfredo Yao: The Juice King. Primer. https://primer.com.ph/busi

ness/2017/06/19/success-story-of-alfredo-yao-the-juice-king/

 Success Story of Injap Sia: Youngest Billionaire in PH. Primer. https://primer.com

.ph/business/2017/07/17/success-story-of-injap-sia-youngest-billionaire-in-ph/

 Gamboa, R. (2016) A very interesting entrepreneurial start. Philstar.

https://www.philstar.com/business/2016/12/10/1651875/very-interesting-

entrepreneurial-start

 Success Story: Dr. Cecilio K. Diokno. HappyNoy. http://happynoy.blogspot.com

/2016/07/success-story-dr-cecilio-k-diokno.html
 Buarao, J. (2020). Corazon D. Ong: The Woman Behind the Success of CDO

Foodsphere Inc. https://josephbuarao.com/blog/corazon-d-ong-the-woman-

behind-the-success-of-cdo-foodsphere-inc/

 Do Won Chang is best known for founding the clothing retail store Forever 21.

Erply. https://erply.com/do-won-chang-is-best-known-for-founding-the-clothing-

retail-store-forever-21/

 Vadagam, S. (2018). The Success Story Of WhatsApp Founder Jan Koum.

Iconic Feeds. http://iconicfeeds.blogspot.com/2017/06/the-success-story-of-what

sapp-founder.html

 Zeall, A. (2018). The Inspiring Story of Ford. Coin Pip. http://blog.coinpip.com/the

-inspiring-story-of-ford/

 Albert, J. (2020). Mark Zuckerberg Struggle and Success Story. https://jamesalb

ert1.medium.com/mark-zuckerberg-struggle-and-success-story-1b1c61e0ab49

 Nair, A. (2021). Every Rise and Fall Was an Opportunity for Steve Jobs.

https://businessconnectindia.in/success-story-steve-jobs/

 Nair, A. (2021). Success Story of Bill Gates – A Life Filled with Successes.

https://businessconnectindia.in/bill-gates-success-story/

 Singh, A. (2021) The Success Story of Jeff Bezos. https://businessconnectindia

.in/success-story-jeff-bezos/

 Ravi (2020). Success Story Of Dhirubhai Ambani. https://businessconnectindia

.in/success-story-of-dhirubhai-ambani/

 Yermak, A. (2019). Larry Ellison: Success Story Of The Most Eccentric

Entrepreneur. https://mobecls.com/larry-ellison-success-story-of-the-most-eccent
 ric-entrepreuner/

 Hammad, A. (2020). Success Story of Walt Disney. https://thecircular.org/succ

ess-story-of-walt-disney/