The most successful modern Russian businessmen. The most famous entrepreneurs in the world and Russia

On the occasion of Bill Gates's birthday, we decided to remind you who you should look up to in business today. Here are the “magnificent eight” billionaires of 2014. Condition size and inspirational quotes included.

State:$76 billion

Occupation: IT, investment activities

A country: USA

Quote: “My children, of course, will have a computer. But first of all they will get books."

The richest man on the planet, multi-billionaire William Henry Gates III, popularly known as Bill Gates, celebrated his 59th birthday yesterday, October 28. For almost two decades now, he has been leading the international race for the American dream, not counting a short respite at the end of the last decade, when Gates was briefly surpassed by the Mexican Carlos Slim.

At the end of 2013, the man who created the modern world was once again on the horse. Over the past year, Gates earned another $9 billion without doing anything special - since February, he has been listed as a “technical advisor” to the new head of Microsoft, Satya Nadella.

Bill's main financial activity today is giving money to those in need. His fund to fight polio in third world countries has collectively allocated about $28 billion to these needs. In his free time, the multi-billionaire, without further ado, plays bridge and enjoys a successful life.

State:$72 billion

Occupation: telecommunications

A country: Mexico

Quote: “Many people want to change the world for the better for their children. I’m trying to change my children for the better so that they can serve the world.”

Gates's main "offender", the Mexican oligarch with Arab roots Carlos Slim, ended last year by $4 billion behind the leader of the rating. The collapse of his companies' shares led to the loss of a whole billion; However, in the summer of 2014, Slim more than made up for the fall, bringing his fortune to $79.6 billion - and, as Forbes reports, he again overtook Bill Gates. But while the results of 2014 have not been summed up, we still left the palm to Bill - especially his birthday.

The 74-year-old oligarch owns assets of many companies, including in the United States. In particular, Slim is one of the minority shareholders of The New York Times Co. publishing house. and retailer Saks Fifth Avenue.

A monopolist in the Mexican communications market, Carlos Slim willingly invests in non-core assets. So, in 2012, he acquired the famous football club from Spain Real Oviedo, which was on the verge of bankruptcy; this was preceded by a powerful flash mob to raise funds, launched by former club players.

State:$64 billion

Occupation: fashion retail

A country: Spain

Quote: does not give interviews

The king of fashion retail, founder of the legendary Inditex chain, Amancio amassed a fortune so successful that even three years after leaving the company, it keeps him among the three richest people on the planet.

Over the previous two years, Ortega received $26.5 billion from the powerfully growing shares of his own company and various real estate properties in Spain, the US and the UK.

The billionaire has a particular weakness for buying skyscrapers: today his collection already includes 26 buildings, including the 43-story Torre Picasso in Madrid. After the death of his wife Rosalia Mera in 2013, he was the only one left at the helm of Zara, the future giant Inditex, back in 1975. Ortega himself has three heirs: daughters Sandra and Marta and son Marcos.

State:$58.2 billion

Occupation: investments

A country: USA

Quote: “I am a better investor because I am a businessman, and I am a better businessman because I am an investor.”

The restless old man, the same impenetrable Oracle of Omaha, increased his fortune by another $4.7 billion over the past year. Investment genius Warren Buffett has spent his entire life managing such sums that his own bank account hardly evokes any special feelings in him.

State:$48 billion

Occupation: IT

A country: USA

Quote: “It’s not enough for me to just win. Everyone around should go broke"

The founder and owner of Oracle Corporation became richer by $5 billion in a year, but still could not repeat his own record of 2012 - third place in the ranking of the world's richest people. In September 2014, Ellison, following a certain global trend, left the post of CEO of Oracle after 38 years in this position.

Larry first appeared on the Forbes list of rich people in 1986, when he had $185 million in his accounts. Today, the businessman collects villas on the coast of Malibu and is listed as the owner of almost the entire Hawaiian island of Lanai, where he is trying to create “paradise on Earth.” Why? Because he can afford it.

State:$40 billion each

Occupation: industry

A country: USA

Quote: "Power is coercion"

Successful businessmen are quite common. Actually, the word “luck” is applicable to business, but the overwhelming majority of business people who have achieved success reached the top only thanks to themselves. Some thanks to hard work, some thanks to a great idea that works almost on its own, but the most successful businessmen who reached the top achieved everything thanks to the fact that they broke the rules (sometimes laws) and did everything wrong, but in in the end we won. There are quite a few of them, and I will write about five such people in each post. There will be 4-5 posts in total, and each post is different from the other. Well, let's begin.

So, Jack Welsh.

This legendary businessman turned the mediocre General Electric Company into a giant, a leader in its field. After working in this company for 20 years, in 1981 Welsh (by the way, he demanded that everyone call him by name) became executive director. Nineteen years passed, and in 2000, when he retired, the General Electric Company was no longer worth 13 billion dollars, as in the beginning, but 500 billion - half a trillion. Jack relied heavily on the human element to achieve success. This leader respected all of his employees, and created a system that is the “holy of holies” for modern managers.

Steve Jobs

The history of the well-known Apple corporation begins on April 1, 1976 - although it was officially registered only in 1977. So, the author of most technological developments was Stephen Wozniak, and Jobs acted as a marketer. After Jobs was able to convince the inventor to refine the design of the new microcomputer, the company outlined the first step to the top. Both the Apple I and Apple II were successful - and this allowed the company to become the corporation that is now known throughout the world.

Jobs became a multimillionaire in 1980, when the company's first public sale of shares took place. However, Steve does not stop there, continuing not only to work with Apple, but also mastering new areas of activity for him. So, in 1986, the Pixar studio (The Graphics Group) was purchased from George Lucas himself for $5 million. The studio's profits currently amount to tens of millions of dollars, and all this is thanks to Jobs, who managed to gather fans of his business to achieve the desired result.

Despite the fact that Jobs is criticized for improper parking, some odd behavior, and stinginess in his attitude towards his employees (Jobs flatly refused to pay the company's engineers more than 30 thousand a year), he was and remains the most talented leader among many, many dozens of company leaders and corporations.

Richard Branson

In 1972, when he was only 22 years old, Richard Branson opened his own recording studio, calling it Virgin. In fact, the studio was very far from innocent, working with those artists who were rejected by all other studios. So, the first musician who agreed to collaborate with Branson was Mike Oldfield. And his album “Tubular Bells” sold millions of copies around the world.

After such success, Branson began collaborating with the Sex Pistols - they were not even allowed on the doorstep of any record company. Who doesn't know the Sex Pistols now? This group is known to both fans and opponents of punk rock.

Using his charisma and undoubted leadership talent, Branson became famous as a business shark for whom nothing is impossible. Now Branson has not only a billion-dollar capital, but even his own spaceship. In addition, he deals with almost everything that only generates profit, from music to air transportation.

Sam Walton

The founder of the Wal-Mart brand, Sam Walton, always said that the main rule in business is to break all the rules. “I always tried to break the rules made by others and singled out people who broke my own rules,” says the businessman. In 2002, Exxon Corporation received the title of the largest corporation in the world.

Bill Gates

He is loved and hated, he is worshiped. Despite the fact that Gates evokes mixed feelings, no one can deny his intelligence, talent and ability to work. Gates dropped out of Harvard to start his own small company, called Microsoft, with his friend and partner Paul Allen. Gates decided to go against the rules of open source software, and began to develop his own programs, closing their code from prying eyes. Now Microsoft Corporation is one of the most powerful IT companies that has had a significant impact on the whole world.

On Tuesday, September 19, the results of its special study highlight the 100 greatest business minds in the world.

When creating the list, Forbes experts selected people who had a strong influence on the processes taking place in the business world or inspired the development of entrepreneurship.

This is what the top 10 most outstanding businessmen of our time look like according to Forbes. All of them are distributed alphabetically, and not ranked “from greatest to least merit.”

The man who founded Salesforce started his business at the age of 15. It was at this age that he created Liberty Software, which created games for the Atari 800 computer. By the age of 16, the young man was earning $1,500 a month, enough to pay for his studies at the University of Southern California.

Benioff spent a summer internship at Apple, working as a programmer in the Macintosh division under Steve Jobs. This experience later came in handy as he realized that revolutionary ideas could be encouraged by entrepreneurs.

Currently, Benioff heads the company that develops the cloud CRM system of the same name. This longtime competitor of Oracle is valued at $40 billion. Salesforce's specific idea was to move away from selling software that companies had to install on their servers. Salesforce allowed people to access business applications from a web browser. And although this may not surprise anyone now, in the late nineties it was a revolutionary idea.

Owns Amazon, one of the world's largest online retailers.

It is now difficult to imagine that the office of such a successful company was located in the garage of the future billionaire, where, along with several employees, he began developing software for an online bookstore. The office subsequently expanded into a two-room house. In 1995, the entrepreneur opened Amazon.com, named after a winding South American river.

The businessman, through large retail partnerships, constantly expanded the range of goods that Amazon was ready to offer. Books were followed by CDs and later clothing, electronics, toys and more. Although many of the dot-coms went bankrupt in the early 1990s, Amazon thrived and its annual sales soared from $510,000 in 1995 to more than $17 billion in 2011.

Currently, Bezos's fortune is estimated at $72.8 billion.

Like Bill Gates, Warren Buffett donates billions of dollars to charity, refuting the stereotype of the greed and heartlessness of the “sharks of capitalism.” He tops the list of billionaire philanthropists, having donated more than $46 billion to various causes since 2000. This represents about 71% of his wealth. By comparison, Bill Gates has donated $18 billion or 22% of his wealth since 2000.

This French businessman is one of the owners of the luxury conglomerate LVMH and one of the richest people on Earth. According to Forbes, Arnault's fortune reaches $34 billion.

Arnault has earned the nickname "the wolf in cashmere" due to his acquisitions of numerous fashion and beauty brands, including Givenchy, Guerlain, Sephora, Fendi and Loro Piana, as well as numerous jewelry brands, including TAG Heuer, De Beers and Bulgari. . Many did not believe in the advisability of collecting a variety of brands “under one roof”, since this does not allow them to focus on one direction, moreover, some of the companies acquired by Arnault were direct competitors.

However, Arnault, as a true brilliant entrepreneur, did not pay attention to the critics. He changed the conglomerate's pricing policy, making brand products accessible not only to very wealthy buyers, but also to people with average incomes. And those who are dissatisfied with such “averaging” can always purchase items from expensive limited editions of clothing and accessories.

The founder of Armani is visible proof of the theory that a beautiful person ages gracefully. During his life, he tried many jobs: from a photographer’s assistant to a window designer, but Armani’s fame and fortune came from creating clothing models. At first he did this for various Italian brands, and then in 1974 he introduced clothes under his own name. A year later, succumbing to the persuasion of his friend, the architect Sergio Galeotti, Armani created his own company.

This Italian fashion designer was hired to work on costumes in such cult films as “The Matrix”, “American Gigolo” and “The Untouchables”.

The American businessman, despite his multi-billion dollar fortune ($12.5 billion), leads a fairly modest lifestyle and is not too keen on publicity. He very rarely gives interviews to the press (he gave his last detailed interview in 1974). However, it is known that Anschutz is the head of one of the largest oil companies in the United States, owns several football clubs and cinemas, a railroad and a huge number of farms. Anschutz also owns the telecommunications company Qwest Communications, one of the leaders in this industry in America.

Paul Allen first made his mark in the business world when he co-founded Microsoft with Bill Gates. This happened in 1975, and since then Allen has remained one of the main innovators in the field of entrepreneurship and technology. He is the founder and chairman of Vulcan Inc., which oversees the businessman's philanthropic and business interests, from sports teams such as the Seattle Seahawks and Portland Trail Blazers to cultural preservation projects such as the Seattle Cinerama and the Museum of Pop Culture.

Through his business and philanthropic investments, the Microsoft co-founder has pioneered important developments and innovations in science, technology, space, education and the arts. For example, since 2003, he has invested more than $500 million in basic brain research, opening the Allen Institute for Brain Sciences. He also created the Allen Institute for Cell Science and the Allen Institute for Artificial Intelligence.

For 21 years, Eisner was the permanent leader of The Walt Disney Company. Under him, the Walt Disney Television Animation division appeared, producing cartoons for TV. Children love cartoons in the morning and the ratings from this decision were very good. In addition, Eisner allowed the sale of rights to show old Disney cartoons and films to television companies. These steps significantly strengthened the company's financial position. However, Disney veterans criticized Eisner's actions, reproaching him that he was focused only on making a profit and that the studio's new products had lost the notorious Disney spirit. In 2005, the boss of the Disney Company resigned from his post.

Icahn made his fortune as one of the notorious Wall Street raiders in the 1980s. He owned large stakes in corporations such as RJR Nabisco, Texaco, Phillips Petroleum and Viacom. In addition to raiding, he was involved in the so-called “greenmail”: the buyback of company shares at an inflated price. Icahn's success was such that he largely inspired the screenwriters when creating the image of the famous Gordon Gekko from the film "Wall Street".

Currently, 81-year-old Icahn occupies 43rd place in the Forbes ranking of the richest people.

On the first line in the selection of the best business minds of our time is one of the leaders of the global gaming business, the founder of Las Vegas Sands Corp. and an influential donor to Republicans in the United States.

Adelson's source of wealth and current investments was the computer trade show COMDEX, designed for the computer industry. It was an innovative solution that was incredibly popular. The first event took place in 1979, and in 1995 the businessman sold COMDEX to the Japanese telecommunications corporation SoftBank Japan for $862 million. After that, in 1988, the businessman acquired the popular gambling establishment The Sands Hotel & Casino. Celebrities such as Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin played there, and 1960's Ocean's 11 was filmed there.

However, Adelson later personally blew up The Sands Hotel & Casino to build in its place the luxurious Venetian hotel-casino, decorated in Venetian style (right down to the canals and gondoliers). And then he entered the international arena, building luxurious hotel-casino complexes in a number of countries.

Throughout his career, Sheldon Adelson has created over 50 diverse companies.

Russia was represented in the list of outstanding entrepreneurs of the century by Yuri Milner (55th place). He participated in the creation of Mail.Ru Group and the international venture fund DST Global.

The success of an entrepreneur can be assessed by two main criteria - external and internal.

If an entrepreneur receives a stable profit, his enterprise develops and expands, then such a company and such a leader in the person of those around him are quite successful.

If, at the same time, an entrepreneur likes his occupation, and this does not harm his personal life, family relationships and health, then we can say that this person is happy. He has established himself as a professional, he has time for himself and his family, and he is financially independent. Many of us dream of something like this.

Is it possible to be a successful entrepreneur, achieve success in your own business and still find time for your family? This is not an easy question.

How to become a successful entrepreneur in Russia?

Let's look at seven secrets of successful entrepreneurs that help them achieve results in their work:

Each of us knows what it is. Fear of losing sources of income, fear of failure, failure. Even the fear of communicating with clients is also a serious problem for some entrepreneurs.

Everyone has fears and insecurities. But a successful entrepreneur must rise above his fears. They should motivate him to work more productively and plan more carefully. But do not suppress his will.

When starting any business, a successful entrepreneur sets goals for himself. This is both the direction of the company’s development and other priorities.

Determine one goal for the foreseeable future that will lead your company to results.

If the main goal that the company is striving for is defined, then you do not need to run after every idea that comes to your mind. Achieve one goal and then build on the success.

At the same time, priorities need to be determined. What place should family and personal life occupy? Are you ready to work more, but at the expense of your relationships with your family?

Business requires extreme dedication and concentration, but sometimes you just need to work more productively. If you define one goal and work in one direction, it will bring more results and take less time than if you worked in three directions without paying due attention to each of them.

It is better to start a business in an area in which you understand at least a little.

If you decide to breed earthworms for sale to fishermen, flattered by the high profitability of this type of activity, then think about how and what you will feed them, how you will get them from their habitat, how to store and deliver them to the consumer? Such subtleties can confuse you if you do not understand the habits of earthworms.

Constantly improve in your chosen field of activity in order to understand all the details of your business.

4) Planning.

If you have an understanding of the direction of the company's development, expressed in a calendar schedule for achieving goals, then you will be able to work more fruitfully. If the plan clearly indicates the deadlines, then this is also an incentive to work. You will get more done in less time.

Plans can be divided into several categories - individual and business plans of the company.

In a business plan, you not only reflect all the goals and ways to achieve them, but also analyze competitors and look for reserves for the growth of the enterprise.

An individual or personal work plan for the day, week, month will help you become a highly effective professional. Nothing can distract you if you train yourself to work according to plan.

5) Realism.

How can you ensure that you accomplish everything you have planned for the day? – Set realistic goals and realistic deadlines.

Realism is an important success factor. If your goals are far from reality, and the ways to achieve them seem like a fog to you, then you can forget about big money and a stable business.
All goals reflected in the plan must be realistic. Otherwise, your plan and work on it will only turn into self-criticism and disappointment.

6) Activity.

Without purposeful activity, you will not succeed. Your goals will remain on paper if you don't work hard to achieve them.

Do you want to earn two or three thousand rubles a day while sitting at home and breeding earthworms? Love the manure and the shovel. Every day, start with the hardest work - preparing food for your pets, checking the acidity level of the substrate in which they live.

Active work to achieve a goal is the main factor that leads to success even for those who are not used to planning their time.

7) Willingness for change.

Be ready for change. This is difficult because we strive for peace and minimizing effort, but nothing stands still in the world.

New strong competitors, more advanced products may appear, and consumer demands may change. And what about the tax burden that strangles an entrepreneur like a boa constrictor, sucking out the last juices and nerves? Tax legislation changes every year, and not in favor of the entrepreneur.

But moral preparedness for the fact that tomorrow may be worse than today will help you overcome all obstacles and become a successful entrepreneur.

By overcoming the fear of failure, setting realistic goals, planning every step of the way to achieve them, constantly learning and putting in all the necessary effort, you are sure to become a successful entrepreneur, wise and experienced enough to respond flexibly to all changes in your business.

Every time a global crisis occurs, it hits the main areas of human life. As a rule, companies collapse and production closes with a bang. But in the general chaos, there are entrepreneurs who not only do not pay attention to such shocks, but also benefit from them. And for some, such conditions become prerequisites for developing their own multi-million dollar business.

Of course, if we talk about successful people from other countries, especially distant ones, the example looks uninspiring. After all, these great and successful people developed in conditions different from ours. Therefore, let’s not waste time shaking the air, but let’s talk about several Russian entrepreneurs who today have millions in capital.

Domestic entrepreneurs

The most famous example throughout the country is the Russian young entrepreneurs who created the social network VKontakte. Almost all founders and ideologists have today sold their shares in the business. The reason for this, as one of the main founders Pavel Durov admitted, is the impossible conditions within Russia for the development of honest private business. He complained that there were constant attempts to take over the service, split it up, change it, and then sell it off. After all, he has a huge influence on the public. But Durov did not fight the pressure, but simply emigrated abroad and travels around the world, never staying anywhere for long. And he is gradually developing a new project with his team.

But we are more interested in the fact that, despite the difficult economic period, it was possible to create such a powerful commercial project. For example, one of Durov’s partners, Vyacheslav Mirilashvili, invested $30 thousand in it at the start of the business and within six years became a dollar billionaire in Russia, and the youngest one at that.

But these are not the only domestic entrepreneurs known today who have achieved amazing heights in business in difficult economic times. Below we will talk about a few more.

Maxim Nogotkov

Even during the crisis period, Nogotkov stated that the Russian market is favorable for the development of his business: there are many unfilled niches and a low level of competition. He did not waste words, and four years after such a statement he was included in the ranking of the 200 richest entrepreneurs in Russia thanks to the creation and management of the Svyaznoy group of companies.

Ilya Shershnev

Not every famous businessman in Russia started their business during their student years, but Ilya is one of them. While a student, he worked for the real estate company Penny Lane Realty. Having gained the necessary experience there, he founded his own Swiss Realty Group. By the beginning of the crisis, the company’s annual turnover was $10 billion. But Shershnev had no experience in keeping his brainchild afloat in difficult conditions, so it had to be closed. But the entrepreneur did not retire from business, remaining to work as an expert in this area, evaluating and managing the real estate of three shareholders.

Dmitry Salikhov

Before starting his business, Dmitry changed three different jobs. He was fired from the latter due to staff reduction due to the emerging crisis. But this did not disappoint him. Like many other entrepreneurs, he used this opportunity to start his own business.

It consisted of providing transfer transportation. He began by collaborating with several drivers in their cars, who, by agreement, met passengers at airports and delivered them to the specified addresses. When he had enough funds to open his own office, Salikhov began collaborating with the best taxi services. This gave I’way the status of an organization and brought in corporate clients. Now the company had two offices - one in each of the capitals of Russia.

But Dmitry didn’t stop there. Today, the services of his company can be used in 65 countries in 200 cities. At the same time, Salikov himself admits that he did not expect such a scale of business. His only desire was to occupy a vacant niche.

Andrey Guzairov

Before becoming an entrepreneur, Andrey worked in the West, where he spotted an idea for his own business in Russia. Having accumulated suitable start-up capital in three years, he opened the company CreditCardsOnline. The point of the project was to create a database of information about the offers of all Russian banks for opening credit cards. Today, 25% of the company’s shares belong to the Finam Global fund, and the entrepreneur himself has a couple of Internet projects related to finance.

Andrey Romanenko

Before implementing a successful idea, Andrey sold computer games, then made polyethylene
packages, and the start-up capital was earned from the production of plastic cards. It was quite a profitable business, but Romanenko felt that something more universal could be created. Pondering the options, he came up with the idea of ​​​​creating Qiwi payment terminals. He didn't initially bet big on the project, but it turned out to be surprisingly successful. Already in 2013, it had more than 65 million users every month and a billion dollars in capitalization.

Vsevolod Starkh

Perhaps we bent our hearts when we said that Shershnev is one of the few who started a business while studying at a university. Vsevolod Strakh surpassed him by starting his entrepreneurial activity as a high school student. Even then, he became acutely aware of the need to earn his own money, and the best opportunities for this were provided by the Internet. He started simply: he created his own website, bought a thousand USB cables in bulk and resold them online through his resource. When the enterprise began to develop successfully, he named the online store “Sotmarket” and began selling various accessories for mobile phones. Having accumulated enough funds, he further expanded his assortment with phones themselves, then with small inexpensive equipment.

In 2012, he sold a controlling stake to the IQ One Holdings fund, and the online store grew in value to $100 million. The ideologist and founder himself continues to independently monitor the comments that clients leave on the resource. And there are up to 5 thousand buyers per day.

Dmitry Kibkalo

The formation of this entrepreneur is a confluence of various lucky accidents. Although there is a whole category of people who believe that there are no coincidences. And in some ways they are right. And the matter began with the fact that an employee of the production center, Dmitry Kibkalo, decided to give his father the board game “Jackal” for his birthday. The difficulty was that this pirate game was invented back in the 70s, and today it was not on sale.

Then Dmitry recreated it and turned to the manufacturers for a seal. It’s strange why he didn’t turn to the popular online printing centers, where they make similar things from one copy or more. In any case, this complexity played an important role in Dmitry’s future wealth. He found a company that agreed to print a minimum batch of such a game - 100 copies. He gave one to his father, as planned. The remaining 99 were gradually sold out via the Internet, returning the money invested in literally a month. Dmitry liked this and he created the Mosigra company, which began selling board games, but in an offline format. Today, the chain of stores unites 17 own sales points and 71 franchise projects. Moreover, they work not only in Russia. In total, Dmitry receives about 450 million rubles from the project.

Gevork Sargsyan

It’s difficult to describe Sargsyan’s success. He did a fairly simple thing - he removed the adaptation of foreign games to Russian realities from the status of “pirated” products. True, such a step looks simple only from the outside. He was faced with the need to sign a contract with foreign game manufacturers. To achieve this, I had to use all available communication skills and slightly embellish my capabilities and achievements. However, contracts were received, the Innova company was created and the successful business today brings Gevork one and a half billion rubles. The company is engaged in more than ten gaming projects, the most famous of which are Planet Side II, Lineage II, Aion and others. (11 votes, average: 3 out of 5)

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