Take off with Natarajan

SOURCE:::::SILICON INDIA…..

Natarajan

Bangalore: There has been an ever-growing debate about whether formal education or college degree is necessary to succeed in this world. A degree certainly will give you a higher paying job than those who don’t have a degree, but there are super successful world famous entrepreneurs who have proved that one can succeed without a degree. Let’s have a close look on such entrepreneurs.

Sir Richard Branson – Chairman, Virgin Group

Branson left school at the age of 16 to start his first successful venture which was a magazine calledStudent. Today his brand Virgin has over 400 companies including Virgin Records and Virgin Atlantic Airways. Branson is the 4th richest citizen of the United Kingdom with an estimated net worth of US$4.2 billion. Apart from his successful business streak, he has also made several world record-breaking attempts. For his exceptional achievements, it is hard to believe that he is dyslexic.

Mark Zuckerberg – Founder and CEO, Facebook

Zuckerberg started Facebook from his dorm room at Harvard with roomates Dustin Moskovitz and Chris Hughes in 2004. He left college to concentrate on his site in his sophomore year. Having great interest in computers, he created a messaging program which he named ‘Zucknet’ when he was just 12. Before Facebook, he had developed projects like Synapse, Wirehog and Facemash. In 2010, he was Time magazine’s “Person of the Year”. His net worth now is $ 14.19 billion.

Frederick Henry Royce – Co-founder, Rolls-Royce

Born in 1863, Royce was originally a paper boy and was selling newspapers and delivering telegrams, having had only one year of formal schooling. He co-founded Rolls-Royce with Charles Stewart Rolls in 1906 and privatized it in 1987. Comparing to the millions the company now makes, Royce first drew his meager average salary of £1,250 per annum and died a decorated engineer who gave the world its best car designs without an engineering degree.

Michael Dell – Chairman and CEO, Dell

As a young boy Delldismantled his first computer in his garage. He then started a computer company called PCs Limitedwhile attending college. It became so successful that he dropped out of the college to operate it. In 2006, Dell donated $50 million to the University of Texas at Austin, which he attended but never graduated from. Ranked as the 41tst richest person in the world, he has a net worth of $15.9 billion.

Ingvar Kamprad – Founder IKEA

Kamprad is Swedish business magnate who founded IKEA, a retail company in 1943. He started doing business as a young boy when he used to sell matches to neighbours from his bicycle. He then expanded to sell fish, Christmas tree decorations, seeds, ballpoint pens and pencils. He founded IKEA at his Uncle Ernst’s kitchen table. IKEA is an acronym for his name and Elmtaryd, the family farm where he was born, and the nearby village Agunnaryd. According to Swedish business weekly Veckans Affärer, he is the richest person in the world. This report is based on the assumption that Kamprad owns the entire company. His actual net worth though is $ 6 billion.

Lord Alan Sugar – Founder, Amstrad

Sugar left school at the age of 16 and later founded the electronic company ‘Amstrad’ (Alan Michael Sugar Trading) which he sold in 2007 for £125 million. He owns several other companies like Amsair and Amsprop. His net worth is $1.14 billion. He has also served Tottenham Hotspur as its chairman from 1991 to 2001. Sugar features in the UK version of ‘The Apprentice’. Sugar was knighted in 2000 for hisexceptional services to business.

Bill Gates – Co-founder and Chairman, Microsoft

Gates started programming as an interest when he was in preparatory school in Seattle. When he was 14, Gates earned $20,000 from his first programming venture. He scored an almost perfect 1590 in his SAT and joined Harvard but left without a degree to co-found Microsoft. For one of his house in Washington he pays $ 1 million property tax annually. Currently worth $ 61 billion, Gates has been continually topping the list of richest people since 1995.

Sir Philip Green – Owner, Arcadia Group

Philip Green inherited his family business at the age of 12. He started working for a shoe importer three years later after dropping from school. His net worth is $ 6.7 billion, which he has earned by buying and selling various British retailers. Since 1992, he has links in different businesses and supports his wife in managing the Arcadia Group. He has also been involved in a lot of controversies.

Steve Jobs – Co-founder, Apple

Known for bringing the technology revolution with Apple products, Jobs left college after just one semester. He was fired from his own company Apple in 1985 but later returned as its CEO in 1997. He has also been the CEO of Pixar Animation Studios which he later sold to Disney. In 2007, he was chosen as Fortune Magazine’s most powerful businessman. He died of pancreatic cancer in October 2011 with a fortune of $ 7 billion.

Simon Cowell – A&R Executive

Cowell is well known as a judge on TV shows like Pop Idol, The X Factor, Britain’s Got Talent and American Idol. He attended Dover College but left after taking GCE O levels. He is also the owner of the television production and music publishing house Syco. He was at number 41 in a list of “The World’s 50 Most Influential Figures 2010” compiled by the British magazine New Statesman in 2010. His net worth is estimated to be $ 331 million.
Giorgio Armani – Founder, Armani

Born in 1934, Armani wanted to make a career in medicine. So he joined Catholic University of the Sacred Heart. After two years, he was called for military services where he worked in the military hospital. Bitter experience there made him to drop medicine and adapt Fashion. He founded Armani in 1975 which makes clean tailored men’s wear. Having a fortune of $ 7 billion, he was billed as the best fashion designer to come out of Italy.

Duncan Bannatyne – Chairman, Bannatyne Group

Duncan Bannatyne is a Scottish entrepreneur, whose net worth is $ 675 million. Apart from business interests in hotels, spas, health clubs, media, property, he also likes writing. He has written 5 books. He says that he did not have a bank account until the age of 30 having spent half of his life with almost no money. He is also involved in politics and does charity too.

Asa Candler – Founder,Coca-Cola

Born in 1929, he founded the world’s favourite drink Coca Cola. Never attending school, he started his business career as a drugstore owner and manufacturer of patent medicines. In 1887, he bought the formula forCoca-Cola from its inventor John Pemberton and several other shareholders for $2,300 and started its commercial distribution. He also served as the 44th Mayor of Atlanta, Georgia from 1916 to 1919 and established Central Bank and Trust Corp.

Ralph Lauren – Founder, Polo Ralph Lauren

In high school, Lauren sold neckties to his fellow students from his store with the name Polo. In his yearbook, he stated that he wanted to be a millionaire. He studied business for two years at Baruch College but never graduated. He is now the 173rd richest person with a fortune of $ 11.9 billion. Fond of automobiles, he has a collection of more than 70 rare cars.

Ruth Handler – Creator of Barbie

Handler was an American businesswoman who is remembered for making the famous Barbie Doll. She also became the president of toy company Mattel. Handler had noted that her daughter Barbara who was a pre-teen played with her dolls giving them adult roles. So she got an idea to create Barbie doll with an adult body. Her husband Elliot Handler and his partner Harold “Matt” Matson, who founded Mattel initially, thought that this doll wouldn’t sell.

David Karp – Founder and CEO, Tumblr

Karp has done home-schooling and never attended college. He founded Tumblr, a blogging platform in 2007. In 2010,he was named as one of the top 35 innovators in the world under the age of 35. He has an estimated net worth of $ 40 million.

Sean Quinn – Founder, Quinn Group

The son of a small farmer, Quinn left school at 14 years of age, took a loan 100 pounds and started doing business. In 2008 he was the richest person in Ireland. He has created a fortune of $ 9 billion. But in 2011 he was filed for bankruptcy.

Dave Thomas – Founder and CEO, Wendy’s

Thomas was an American fast-food tycoon known for his food chain Wendy’s, which he founded in 1969. Born to single mother whom he never knew, he never attended school and got lessons of life from his grand mother. He had worked in the US Army and also in KFC. He is also known for appearing in more than 800 ads for the Wendy’s, more than any other company founder in television history.

Coco Chanel – Fashion Designer

Chanel was the founder of the ‘Chanel’ brand. She was the only fashion designer to be named on Time 100: The Most Important People of the Century. Living a nomadic life in her childhood, she never attended school. She learned the art of sewing and worked as seamstress. Apart from that she sang in a cabaret, where she got the name ‘Coco’. She then founded Chanel which had many of her own inventions.