Henry Ford

Henry Ford was 40 years old when he founded the Ford Motor Company in 1903. That was not an easy task – to start producing cars at that time. To start such production you need a lot of money, but Henry Ford was not a rich man. He had to look for investors. And it was a very difficult task to find the investors. Why? Because people did not believe in great future for cars at that time. People used horses and were frightened by the machines moving without a horse. At last, Henry Ford found twelve investors. They gave him 28 thousand dollars and he opened a small factory in Detroit, Michigan.

At first, the company produced only two-three cars a day. In nineteen-oh-three (1903), the company sold its first car. That sale was the beginning of Henry Ford's dream. He wanted to build a good, but not expensive car for the general public. He said many times: "I want to make a car that anybody can buy." 

To keep prices low, Henry Ford decided to build just one kind of a car. He called it the "Model T”. It was a simple machine, but very fast and reliable. Americans loved the "Model T” so much, that they even wrote songs about it.

The first price of the model was eight hundred fifty dollars, but later, as production rose, Ford lowered prices. By 1916 the price had dropped to three hundred forty-five dollars. At the same time Henry Ford raised his workers' pay. His workers earned 2 dollars a day. That was the same as at other factories. Henry Ford raised the pay to 5 dollars a day. Henry Ford and his cars were getting more and more popular.

In 1923 some investors wanted to buy Ford company and they were ready to pay for the company one thousand million dollars!!!

Henry Ford expanded and controlled his company for about 40 years. He created the world's largest and most profitable company. The company was able to survive the Great Depression.

Today Ford Motor Company is one of the largest family-controlled companies in the world. It has been in continuous family control for over 100 years. Ford produces about 5 million automobiles and employs about 200 thousand employees. The company has around 90 plants worldwide. It operates in North and South America, in Europe, in Asia, Africa and Middle East.

Today the company manufactures a wide range of cars: sports cars, touring cars (Focus, Falcon etc.), a number of truck models, buses and tractors. It is developing fuel-saving technologies, for example, electric cars, hydrogen cars and others. As before, the company is focusing on creating vehicles that are simple, durable and lightweight with reasonable prices. The company is looking for new ways to stay competitive and profitable in the global market.

Warren Buffett

Early Life

Businessman and investor, Warren Buffett was born on August 30, 1930 in the state Nebraska, the USA. Buffett's father Howard worked as a stockbroker and served as U.S. Congressman. His mother was a homemaker. Buffett was the second of three children and the only boy.

Buffett demonstrated a knack for financial and business matters early in his childhood. Friends and acquaintances have said the young boy was a mathematical prodigy, and was able to add large columns of numbers in his head.

Warren often visited his father's stockbrokerage shop as a child, and chalked in the stock prices on the blackboard in the office. At 11 years old he made his first investment; he bought three shares of Cities Service Preferred at $38 per share. The stock quickly dropped to only $27, but Buffett held on tenaciously until they reached $40. He sold his shares at a small profit, but regretted the decision when Cities Service shot up to nearly $200 a share. He later cited this experience as an early lesson in patience in investing.

First Entrepreneurial Venture

By the age of 13, Buffett was running his own businesses as a paperboy and selling his own horseracing tip sheet. That same year, he filed his first tax return, claiming his bike as a $35 tax deduction.

In 1942, Buffett's father was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives, and his family moved to Virginia, to be closer to the congressman's new post. Buffett attended High School in Washington, D.C., where he continued plotting new ways to make money. During his high school tenure, he and a friend purchased a used pinball machine for $25. They installed it in a Washington, D.C. barbershop and, within a few months, the profits of the machine allowed Buffett and his friend to buy other machines. Buffett owned three machines in three different locations before he sold the business to a War Veteran for $1,200.

Higher Education

Buffett enrolled at the University of Pennsylvania at the age of 16 to study business. He stayed two years, moved to the University of Nebraska to finish up his degree, and emerged from college at age 20 with nearly $10,000 from his childhood businesses.

Buffett attended Columbia University for his advanced degree and in 1956, shortly after graduation, he formed the firm Buffett Partnership in his hometown of Omaha. His investment successes, particularly in buying undervalued companies whose stocks shortly began to rise, made him extremely rich and gained him the sobriquet, "Oracle of Omaha." Other notable career succeses include helping rescue Salomon Brothers from corporate raiders (1987) and taking charge of the New York City house (1992) in the wake of an insider trading scandal.

Record-Breaking Donation

In June 2006, Buffett made an announcement that he would be giving his entire fortune away to charity, committing 85 percent of it to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. This donation became the largest act of charitable giving in United States history.

The majority of Buffett's considerable fortune was amassed through Berkshire Hathaway, a company for which he is the largest shareholder and CEO. Ranked as Forbes' wealthiest man in 2008, his net worth is estimated at more than $62 billion.

Надежда Юрьевна Басуева