Richest man

Chapter 24 Asia: Nobutada Saji (1)
——Nobutada Saji: Defeating Tsutsumi and Masayoshi Son with Beer In 1979, American young scholar Vogel published the book "Japan No. [-]: Enlightenment to the United States". .Since then, the Japanese economy has become the focus of the world: from a defeated country in the Second World War, it has rapidly risen to the world's second largest economy.Along with the economic rise, a large number of well-known enterprises have emerged in Japan: Panasonic, Sony, Toyota... These enterprises almost represented the highest manufacturing level in the world at that time; and correspondingly, a group of entrepreneurs: Konosuke Matsushita, Akio Morita, Kaoru Iue, Yoshiaki Tsutsumi...

But since 1989, Japan has become the focus of people's discussion with another diametrically opposite image: in the more than ten years since 1989, the Japanese economy has entered the longest winter after the war.In Huawei CEO Ren Zhengfei's famous article "The Spring of the North Country", we can read his personal experience of the Japanese economy at that time: "Ten consecutive years of low growth, zero growth, negative growth... the vast majority of Japanese companies, nearly Eight years without a wage increase..."

This super-strong cold current kept the entire Japanese economy in a kind of cold memory in the last 20 years of the 2001th century. Looking forward to the arrival of spring has become the common desire of the entire Japanese nation.But the severe cold obviously surpassed people's imagination. When the dot-com bubble burst in 98, another unexpected cold wave shattered another myth of Japan's wealth - the software banking group, which had a worth of tens of billions of dollars at that time. Chairman Sun Zhengyi, in just two years, his wealth has shrunk by 775%, from 15 billion to [-] billion U.S. dollars, thus becoming the fastest shrinking rich man in the world. The shattering of Japan's new economic myth.Thereafter, people are interested in who else in Japan will not fall

Spring has finally arrived, but everything that used to be is gone.

When "Forbes" magazine routinely launched its list of the world's richest people in 2003, what people found on it was not Yoshiaki Tsutsumi who made his fortune through real estate, or Masayoshi Son who became rich overnight through the Internet, but George who sold alcohol. Nobutada.After that, the name was still on the ranking list in 2004 and 2005!
"This is a return of business, and it is also the inevitable result of business development." After "Forbes" announced the richest man list in 2004, a Japanese media commented on Japan's richest man.Indeed, after experiencing the real estate boom and Internet boom, which created the wealth myth of getting rich overnight, business seems to be returning to the most basic primitive state. The balance of wealth no longer tilts towards the real estate or IT industry, but gradually returns to From the mass consumer goods that are closely related to ordinary people, and the related distribution industry, the transformation of the rich list in recent years has become the best example.What followed this change was the change in Japanese business history—from Yoshiaki Tsutsumi, Masayoshi Son to Nobutada Saji, just like a Hollywood drama, interpreting the ups and downs of Japanese business history.

Yoshiaki Tsutsumi: Witnessing the Rise of Japan

When Yoshiaki Tsutsumi, the founder of Japan's Seibu Group, became the richest man in the world in 20 with a net worth of US$1 billion, the Japanese economy was standing at the top of the world with great pride.The richest man in Japanese history once owned some fantastic numbers: In 6 years, he bought 1650/10 of the land in Japan, with a huge family property of 4 billion US dollars, far surpassing Bill Gates and [-]% of Panasonic. times, Rockefeller's [-] times.Under his leadership, Japan's Seibu Group has become a giant controlling Japan's hotel, railway, department store, amusement and other service industries.And the era of his rise was also the era when Japan's post-war economic recovery was the fastest.

In 1935, Tsutsumi Yoshiaki was born in a wealthy Japanese family with "both political and business links".His father, Kojiro Tsutsumi, founded the family business Seibu Group.Under the strict teaching of his father, Yoshiaki Tsutsumi developed a character of perseverance, prudence, independence, and independent thinking from an early age.

After going to university, Yoshiaki Tsutsumi's business talent gradually emerged.At a young age, he followed his father's idea of ​​"developing to increase land prices" and decided to build a large-scale ice rink, alpine ski resort, and multi-functional swimming pool in the Karuizawa area.This idea surprised Kojiro Tsutsumi, because even Kojiro Tsutsumi himself hadn't thought of comprehensive development, but Yoshiaki Tsutsumi had noticed.

In 1965, Tsutsumi Kojiro died of illness, and Tsutsumi Yoshiaki officially took over the Seibu Group.However, he did not start to show his skills right away, but followed one of his father's wills: "Don't invest in any new real estate within 10 years after my death." .From the beginning of taking over to [-], he really did not invest in any large-scale real estate projects.The result of the waiting was the golden age of the Japanese economy.

In 1975, Yoshiaki Tsutsumi, who had been silent for 10 years, began to make a move. After careful consideration, he decided to withdraw from the real estate industry and turn to the service industry based on leisure and tourism.Moreover, after [-] years of thinking, Tsu Mingyi has strengthened his original thinking. He believes that it is difficult for an isolated entertainment project to attract the attention of the public. When there are many entertainment projects, it will become a hot spot of people's attention.Therefore, the development strategy of purchasing a large area of ​​land, carrying out large-scale and comprehensive development, and making this place a tourist attraction was formed in Tsutsumi's mind.The first test field was the Shinagawa area in Tokyo. At this time, Yoshiaki Tsutsumi's Shinagawa Prince Hotel had been repaired, but the benefits were mediocre.After the addition of entertainment facilities such as skating rinks and ski resorts, the benefits of the hotel have greatly increased.After the success of this experiment, Yoshiaki Tsutsumi attacked quickly and successively built Seibu leisure hotels in Naeba, Furano, Hokkaido, Nephew, Hakone and other places.All of a sudden, Yoshiaki Tsutsumi became the most sought-after figure in Japan—he no longer needed to look for land development, because many local officials would visit him in person and invite him to develop local land.

During this period, Tsutsumi Yoshiaki built his Seibu Empire. Through continuous land enclosure and development, his group owned almost one-sixth of Japan's land. Then he broke out and became the most successful businessman in Japanese history. At this time, the adventurous side of his character was also revealed.

When Yoshiaki Tsutsumi bought the Lions baseball team in 1979, he knew nothing about baseball at the time, but he saw the potential of baseball as a sport -- something that can drive thousands of people crazy. with huge business opportunities.Facts have proved that baseball has almost become a "national game" in Japan, which shows that Yoshiaki Tsutsumi has a far-sighted vision.

After taking over the team, Yoshiaki Tsutsumi managed the team as a company, which was also unprecedented in the Japanese baseball world at the time.In the first year of taking over, the Seibu Lions lost every game.But in the second and third years, the results began to improve by leaps and bounds, jumping to No.4, and in 1983, it even ascended the throne of the Japanese Professional Baseball League championship.At the same time, he strengthened the management of the stadium, requiring that "our stadium must have its own characteristics, with the slogan of 'service quality first'".His souvenir sales reach 30 billion to 40 billion yen per year, which is 10 times the sales volume of the second place.

The great success in baseball has greatly enhanced Yoshiaki Tsutsumi's confidence in developing new projects.Following this line of thought, he moved into many sports such as tennis and skiing, and gradually became a giant in the Japanese sports world. He once served as the vice president of the Japan Sports Association and represented the Japan Sports Association in the Olympic Games.

Therefore, in the eyes of many people, Yoshiaki Tsutsumi is almost a genius-like figure, and his deeds are unmatched by anyone in the same period.Akio Morita of Sony once said: "Among the young entrepreneurs in Japan today, there are not many people who are as courageous, talented, and decisive as Yoshiaki Tsutsumi. My greatest misfortune is that I was born in the same generation as Yoshiaki Tsutsumi. "For this reason, some of Yoshiaki Tsutsumi's experiences have become the most valuable wealth in the Japanese business world and are regarded as the imperial decree of management. They are:
——Look at people for three years.Yoshiaki Tsutsumi believes that employees can only make a correct evaluation of him after three years in the company, otherwise they will not know his true value.Based on this, Yoshiaki Tsutsumi hates "smart people" and never gives credit to those employees who can do a very good job right from the start.On the contrary, he always gives chances to employees who start out slow, inexpressive, and ugly, because he believes that only hard work can really do a good job.Tsutsumi Yoshiaki believes that it is not difficult to do well at one time, but it is difficult to do well in the long run.This is now widely accepted by Japanese companies.

——Tsutsu Yoshiaki is also a loyal believer in Japan's lifetime employee system.One of the basic principles of his treatment of employees is that he will never fire employees. He believes that if you don't do a job for 20 years, you won't become a real expert.But he has always demanded that employees should have loyalty.Compared with talent, the focus should be on how to faithfully follow the company's will to do things.

Konosuke Matsushita, known as the "God of Management", praised Tsutsumi's unique insights: "Tsutsu Yoshiaki is the second generation who combines entrepreneurship and business keeping. , he is a prosperous and wise emperor like Emperor Taizong of Tang Dynasty in China, and the ancestor of Zhongxing!"

Perhaps this is also the case. Yoshiaki Tsutsumi opened up the territory of his empire with a vision that surpassed his contemporaries. In his imperial castle that occupies one-sixth of Japan's land, any reputation is not too high.The rise of Yoshiaki Tsutsumi is also a symbol of the rise of Japan.In fact, in the later period of Yoshiaki Tsutsumi's glory, there was a wave of real estate purchases in Japan, and it extended its tentacles to the United States on the other side of the ocean. In 1986, Japanese real estate investment in the United States was 100 billion U.S. dollars, and by 1991, it had grown to 770 billion U.S. dollars.When a Japanese named Hideki Yokoi bought the Empire State Building in Manhattan on August 1991, 8, all Americans exclaimed: "What are the Japanese going to do...they want to buy America!!" Yoshiaki Tsutsumi He has witnessed the rise of Japan, and even to a certain extent, he is the founder of Japan's glory.

But the drama of history is that it never moves in a straight line.Just when people thought that the story would continue to develop like this, history pushed the result to a completely unfamiliar new situation—Japan's real estate boom cooled rapidly amid Japan's economic crisis. In 1993, Japan's 21 largest banks announced that they had $1100 billion in bad debt, a third of which was related to real estate.As a result, Japan's real estate collapsed rapidly, and all house prices fell by at least 50%, and some major areas in Tokyo fell by as much as 80%!

Thus ends the myth, without needing any words.

So did Yoshiaki Tsutsumi.

However, the legend about Yoshiaki Tsutsumi revived again in 2005, because he was arrested. As a result, all the myths about him came to an end. On March 2005, 3, 3-year-old Yoshiaki Tsutsumi Ming was arrested by the Tokyo District Public Prosecutor's Office.In the later years of his legendary life, Yoshiaki Tsutsumi had to end his life as a "liar".The Seibu Group, which once brought him a glorious history, was also kicked out of the Tokyo Stock Exchange because of this incident.The title of honorary member of the International Olympic Committee, which he was most proud of, was also withdrawn by the International Olympic Committee on a certain day in March 70.Masayoshi Son: Build an Empire by Dreaming

After Yoshiaki Tsutsumi, Masayoshi Son is building another form of empire.

Some people say that he is a gambler and a speculator in the Internet age, but others say that he is the person who "led Japan out of the dark age of the Internet"; some people say that he is half a venture capitalist and half an entrepreneur; His achievements are higher than Bill Gates, and even Yang Zhiyuan can't compare... There are various theories, but these are not enough to summarize the whole of Masayoshi Son.

Sun Zhengyi likes his own sentence the most: "In the beginning, all we had were dreams and unfounded self-confidence, but everything started from here." So he made a plan for his life:
Make a name for yourself before the age of 30;
Accumulate at least 40 billion yen in funds before the age of 1000, and own more than 1000 companies;

A showdown before the age of 50;
Completed business before the age of 60 (with a turnover of at least 1 trillion yen);

Hand over the baton before the age of 70, and let the next generation inherit the business.

…………

When he made this plan, he was only 19 years old and had only a little over $100 on him.And when his SoftBank Group achieved great success in 1995, he believed that his company would become a big business that lasted for 300 years, because he believed that "100 years is too short, and 500 years is too unrealistic, only 300 years is appropriate".

This is Masayoshi Son - you never know everything about him from one aspect.So in 1999, he was rated as the champion among the 25 global "management elites" by the American "Business Weekly", and "Forbes" magazine called him "the hottest entrepreneur in Japan".However, a book published in [-] gave the best explanation of Masayoshi Son's success: a dream builder in an era full of passion, but this dream woke up at the dawn of the new century.

On August 1957, 8, Masayoshi Son was born in Maqi City, Saga Prefecture, Japan. His grandfather was an immigrant from South Korea before World War II, and Masayoshi Son was the third generation of immigrants. Therefore, when he was born, Masayoshi Son's name is "Amben Masayoshi".

At the age of 16, Sun Zhengyi, who was in the first year of high school, used his summer vacation to go to California, USA to experience the study and life of American students. In just one month, his life was completely changed.After returning to Japan, he resolutely embarked on the road of studying abroad, regardless of the opposition of his relatives and friends, and his mother's tearful plea.

(End of this chapter)