Category Big Business1

MRF (Madras Rubber Factory) is India’s No.1 tyre manufacturing company. It was started in the year 1946 by K M Mammen Mappillai as a small toy balloon unit. In 1964 MRF established an overseas office at Beirut, Lebanon to tap the export market. This was amongst India’s very first efforts on tyre exports. In 1989 the company collaborated with US–based Hasbro International, the world’s largest toy maker and launched Funskool India. In the same year it entered into a pact with Vapocure of Australia to manufacture polyurethane paint formulations and with Pirelli for Muscleflex conveyor and elevator belting.

Currently MRF exports tyres to over 65 countries including America, Europe, Middle East, Japan, and the Pacific region. It presently has overseas offices in Dubai, Vietnam and Australia.

It manufactures its Muscleflex brand of conveyor belting at one of the most advanced state–of–the–art facilities in India. Incorporating the latest manufacturing techniques in processes beginning with mixing, calendaring and the like to manufacturing of the finished products, all of which is in–house, Muscleflex –conveyor belting has gained rapid acceptance in markets worldwide.

It is the most advanced precured retreading system in India. MRF forayed into retreading as far back as 1970. Today, MRF has perfected the art of recured retreading with its extensive knowledge in tyres and rubber.

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Mysore Sandal Soap is a brand of soap manufactured by the Karnataka Soaps and Detergents Limited (KSDL), a company owned by the government of Karnataka in India. This soap has been manufactured since 1916, when Krishna Raja Wadiyar IV, the king of Mysore, set up the Government Soap Factory in Bangalore. The main motivation for setting up the factory was the excessive sandalwood reserves that the Mysore Kingdom had, which could not be exported to Europe because of the First World War. In 1980, KSDL was incorporated as a company by merging the Government Soap Factory with the sandalwood oil factories at Shimoga and Mysore. Mysore Sandal Soap is the only soap in the world made from 100% pure sandalwood oil. KSDL owns a proprietary geographical indication tag on the soap, which gives it intellectual property rights to use the brand name, to ensure quality, and to prevent piracy and unauthorised use by other manufacturers. In 2006, Mahendra Singh Dhoni, the Indian cricketer was selected as the first brand ambassador of the Mysore Sandal Soap.

Recalls an old-time employee, MB Rao, “The company, after the glorious days of the Wadiyars, was on subsistence functioning till it got a Geographical Indicator or GI tag in 2006. From then on, the products, especially Mysore Sandalwood Soap, got a boost and revenues have been going up steadily.”

The makers of Mysore Sandal Soap launched on 4 November 2017, a new basket of soaps with brand name Mysoap in variants of Rose Milk Cream, Jasmine Milk Cream, Orange Lime, Cologne Lavender, and Fruity Floral. Each variety is exclusively packaged depicting ethnic Indian woman in traditional looks. The soap weighs 100 g.

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For 47-year-old Dhiman Das, the past 26 years have been spent on protecting brand ‘K C Das’ and a short time in warding off an attempt by Odisha to usurp the legacy of Bengal’s culinary icon – the heavenly dessert Rasgulla, nee Rossogolla.

Both the Rasgulla and K C Das, the Kolkata firm that popularised the sweetmeat around the world by first selling it in cans, are the family heirlooms of Dhiman Das, who comes from the lineage of Nobin Chandra Das, the inventor of Rasgulla, and his son Krishna Chandra Das (K C Das), after whom the company is named.

Dhiman Das, who became a director of K C Das at a young age of 21 in 1993, recalls how he had to crack the whip to prevent the company from going to ruin.

N C Das, who had started the confectionary in Bagbazar in 1866, was a creative person who wanted to serve his customers something unique. It put him on an exploratory path that ended in the unique spongy sweet emerging out of his frying pan.

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Wipro is an integrated corporation that offers a diverse range of products, solutions and services in systems, software, consumer care, healthcare, lighting and infrastructure technology. We are driven by our passion for quality and our commitment to customers. This drive has catapulted us among the ten most admired companies in India. Through constant innovation and a people-first attitude, we strive to assume leadership positions in all our businesses in the new millennium.
In 1945, Muhammed Hashim Premji incorporated Western Indian Vegetable Products Ltd, based at Amalner, a small town in the Jalgaon district of Maharashtra. It used to manufacture cooking oil under the brand name Sunflower Vanaspati, and a laundry soap called 787, a byproduct of oil manufacture.

The company was a manufacturer of vegetable and refined oils under the name of Sunflower. Kisan and Camel were the other popular trade names in early days of Wipro. The company was then called Western Indian Vegetable Products.
 

MH Premji passed away in 1966, it was then Azim Premji was forced to return to India from the Stanford University. He took charge of the company and diversified its offerings. The company offered toiletries, soaps, lighting products and hydraulic cylinders then.

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Tata Iron and Steel Company (TISCO) was founded by Jamshetji Tata and established by Dorabji Tata on 26 August 1907. The first steel ingot was manufactured on 16 February 1912. During the First World War (1914-1918), the company made rapid progress. By 1939, it operated the largest steel plant in the British Empire. The company launched a major modernization and expansion program in 1951. Later, in 1958, the program was upgraded to 2 million metric tonnes per annum (MTPA) project. By 1970, the company employed around 40,000 people at Jamshedpur, and a further 20,000 in the neighbouring coal mines. In 1971 and 1979, there were unsuccessful attempts to nationalise the company. In 1990, the company began to expand, and established its subsidiary, Tata Inc., in New York. The company changed its name from TISCO to Tata Steel Ltd. in 2005.

 Tata Steel operates in 26 countries with key operations in India, Netherlands and United Kingdom, and employs around 80,500 people. Its largest plant (10 MTPA capacity) is located in Jamshedpur, Jharkhand. In 2007, Tata Steel acquired the UK-based steel maker Corus. It was ranked 486th in the 2014 Fortune Global 500 ranking of the world’s biggest corporations. It was the seventh most valuable Indian brand of 2013 according to Brand Finance.

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Tribhuvandas Kishibhai Patel (22 October 1903 – 3 June 1994) was the founder of the Kaira District Co-operative Milk Producers’ Union in 1946, and later the Amul co-operative movement in Anand, Gujarat, India.

Honesty of purpose and sincerity of his efforts at social service earned him respect of the masses. Tribhuvandas Patel developed the institution which Sardar had made him responsible for. The basic approach adopted by Shri Tribhuvandas Patel was first to establish milk co-operatives in the villages. These co-operatives were literally the “base” of the entire venture.

He insisted that each village co-operative should be open to all milk producers in the village regardless of caste, creed or community. He placed equal emphasis on the principle of ‘one man one vote’ regardless of each member’s social and economic status. He never looked back since then and gave the dairy cooperative movement world recognition with the assistance of Dr. Verghese Kurien, better known as “Father of White Revolution” in India.

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Shree Krishna Khaitan made his surname the last name in fans. His vision, courage and innovative spirit made Khaitan a household name in India and even overseas.

Shree Krishna formed Khaitan Electricals Ltd. in 1981. The Company was driven by his belief that if you spoil your reputation, you lose everything. He had given everything to his fans, including his surname and would not allow anything to tarnish that – whether in India or in the export market, where Khaitan was fast becoming a name to reckon with

He was also the Founder Trustee of Seth Chiranjilal Khaitan Trust and Shree Krishna Foundation among others.

Shree Krishna can be rightfully called the father of branded fans in India. He passed away in November, 2012, leaving behind a vast business empire. But his legend endures through his surname which finds pride of place on every Khaitan product.

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New Delhi Television Limited (NDTV) is a company registered with the Ministry of Corporate Affairs, Government of India – the company that owns two prominent news channels – NDTV 24 x 7 in English and NDTV India in Hindi. It is India’s first independent news network, entering the field at a time when the government-run Doordarshan had a monopoly over television content. The company was founded by Dr. Prannoy Roy and his wife Radhika Roy in 1988.

The following year NDTV launched 3 more channels NDTV Prime (information and entertainment), NDTV Profit (business news channel) and NDTV Good times (lifestyle channel). In 2018 NDTV started a channel for smartphone users NDTV HOP in cooperation with Airtel, Indian telecom company. 

NDTV has a history of hiring Journalists, reporters, anchors with bureaucratic connections. Some of them are: Vikram Chandra is the son of Yogesh Chandra, a former director general of civil aviation, himself the son-in-law of Govind Narain, a former home and Defense Secretary and former Governor of Karnataka.

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           Dorab Tata, Jamsetji’s son took over from him after his demise. He experimented with new sectors and diversified the company and by the 1930s, Tata had its presence in several industries including steel, electricity, education, consumer goods and aviation.

          J R D Tata took over the Tata Group in the late 1930s. When he joined, Tata had 14 companies. When he stepped down, there were 95. His efforts gained global recognition for the Tata Group. He explored new sectors like chemicals, technology, cosmetics, and tea, marketing, engineering, manufacturing, and software services. He also started Tata Airlines that later became Air India. One of the company’s major subsidiaries, Tata Engineering and Locomotive Company (TELCO) that later became Tata Motors was formed in 1945.

          The 1990s were a period of rapid growth for the Tata Group. With Ratan Tata at the helm, the company focused on going international: it also acquired several foreign brands at the same time. The launch of Tata Nano was yet another milestone. Nano became the new ‘people’s car’ as it was an affordable, all-weather form of transport for millions of middle- and lower-income consumers.

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          Disney is credited with creative and entertaining ideas that made the world laugh. Walt Disney began his business with cartoons; he made animated cartoons when animation was taking baby steps.

          Disney also started merchandising his characters; soon markets were full of Mickey Mouse dolls, dishes, toothbrushes and stationery. By 1937, Disney started experimenting with films. Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, his first film was a spectacular hit.

          With his success on screen, Walt Disney wanted to branch out and this time, he chose amusement parks. He was concerned with building a park where parents and children could go and have a good time together. This was the origin of Disneyland.

           The first Disneyland opened in California in 1955. The company never stopped animation; they continued with animated classics like The Jungle Book. By the 1970s, they also began producing educational films. In 1983, they launched the Disney Channel. Today, many big studios and TV stations including Marvel Entertainment, Pixar Animation Studios, and ESPN fall under the Disney umbrella.

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           Imagine your childhood without the fun loving, adventurous Mickey Mouse. Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, Snow White, Cinderella and Rapunzel are some of the characters that filled our childhood. All these names can be traced to Walt Disney, the brain behind the Walt Disney Company.

          Walt Disney arrived in California in the summer of 1923, hoping to make money. He had made a cartoon about a little girl named Alice. A distributor in New York agreed to distribute the Alice Comedies and this was the start of the Walt Disney Company with Walt and his brother Roy as equal partners.

           Disney continued with Alice Comedies for four years, till he introduced a new character named Oswald the Lucky Rabbit. Though the Rabbit conquered children’s minds, Walt lost the copyright of the character and in order to make up for the loss, he created Mickey Mouse. Sound films came out around the same time and Mickey Mouse became a cartoon star in no time.

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          In I995, two computer scientists Larry Page and Sergey Brin met at Stanford University collaborated on writing a program for a search engine. Working from their dorm rooms, the pair built a server network using cheap, used, and borrowed personal computers. It was not a cakewalk, but they managed to come up with a path-breaking search engine- Google.

          Their attempts to license the product failed miserably. Nobody wanted to take the risk of investing in an advanced product at an early stage of development. When all the doors closed, Andy Bechtolsheim, the co-founder of Sun Microsystem appeared as a saviour; he was so impressed by a quick demo of Google that he instantly decided to invest in it. Google Inc. formally came into being in 1998 with the mission to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful. Google achieved a steady growth since then.

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          For a long time, people relied on volumes of encyclopedias for all the information they needed. But the idea of an online encyclopedia is not more than 35 years old.

          Search engines, a sort of online encyclopedia came into being at the beginning of the Internet era. The most popular of them is Google. Got questions or need information about anything under the sun or beyond? Google has got it all.

          A search engine is a program that searches the internet and finds webpages based on the keywords that you provide. When it was first released in 1995, Google was considered unique because of the technology it used. In those days, search engines ranked results based on how often a search term appeared on a webpage.

          Google used something called PageRank, which allowed them to determine the relevance of a website by considering the number of pages, along with its importance using a technology known as backlink analysis. This simplified web searches.

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           Facebook is the world’s most popular social networking page. Its popularity spread like wildfire when Mark Zuckerberg along with his classmates Eduardo Saverin, Dustin Moskovitz, and Chris Hughes set up Facebook.

           It was launched in 2004 as ‘The Facebook’ and the access was restricted to Harvard students. The website allowed students to rate the photographs of other students. Students who signed up for the service could post photographs of themselves and personal information about their lives. Its popularity increased; within 24 hours, 1,200 Harvard students had signed up, and in a month’s time, over half of the undergraduate population had a profile.

          The network soon extended to other universities and high schools in the US and later to the UK. In 2005, it was renamed as Facebook and a year later, it went beyond educational institutions. Anybody who was thirteen years of age with a registered email could create an account on Facebook.

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          Alibaba, one of the world’s largest e-commerce ventures came into existence in 1999. It was founded by Jack Ma along with 17 others. Jack Ma was a Chinese who taught English. During one of his visits to the US, he learned about the growing internet market. He then decided to start one in his country.

          While sitting in a cafe in San Francisco, he thought of the name Alibaba. Alibaba is a famous character from Thousand and One Nights. He asked the waitress if she knew Alibaba. The waitress nodded and said, ‘Open Sesame’. He asked the same to many others and none of them found it difficult to recognize the name. The name was easy to pronounce and globally known; therefore he chose it for his company.

           Luck and time favoured Jack Ma. When he launched Alibaba’s online retail platform, the consumer internet boom had just arrived in China. The company made money from commissions on sales, fees for memberships, advertising and other services. When it needed technological assistance, Alibaba partnered with Yahoo. In 2016, Alibaba made a mark when the company crossed the revenue of its American counterparts such as Amazon and eBay. Two years later, Alibaba became the second Asian company to cross the $500 billion valuation mark.

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          Netflix, the American entertainment company has evolved with the changing times. It began as a DVD rental company and is now the world’s largest media-streaming platform.

          Back in 1997, American entrepreneurs Reed Hastings and Marc Randolph saw an opportunity for business in renting DVDs. By 1999, they started an online subscription programme, wherein subscribers could choose the movie and show titles online and the DVDs would be mailed to them. Netflix had thousands of movie titles in its catalogue and more than 100 distribution centres.

          With the advancement of technology, Netflix started streaming movies and shows directly through the Internet. This happened in 2007 and for most subscription plans, the streaming service was unlimited. By 2010, they cut down DVDs and went for unlimited streaming plans. The same year, Netflix went international. 2013 marked another achievement; Netflix started producing original content, starting with the series ‘The House of Cards’. By the end of 2018 Netflix offered approximately 1,000 original titles.

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          Amazon began with the promise of delivering any book to any reader anywhere. This was the beginning of a changing book world. Though there were established bookseller chains, Amazon survived by helping publishers clear their backlists of slow-selling books.

          In 2007, Amazon introduced Kindle, an e-book platform. Kindle enabled readers to browse, download and buy books and other online content. Also, it was cheaper than other e-books. This revolutionized the book business; Kindle began to outsell printed books. 2009 was another landmark for Amazon’s book hub.

          The company introduced its first publishing line, Amazon Encore, concerned with popular self-published and out-of-print books. This platform gained popularity as it also let individuals publish their own e-books. In 2011, Amazon began publishing its own titles. Amazon is now a major competitor in the book industry.

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          Amazon is one of the world’s largest e-service providers. Started by Jeff Bezos in 1994, Amazon now provides everything under the sky in their online store.

          When Jeff Bezos began his business, he wanted his enterprise to be known as a technology company that made online transactions simpler. He started his venture in Seattle. The people of Seattle were technology savy as Microsoft was located there. He started with online retailing of books. Though many business experts predicted that Amazon would become a grand failure, the venture exceeded their expectations; they focused on growing big, fast.

          The company went public in 1997 and they diversified into selling music and videos. In 1998, Amazon began international operations by acquiring online booksellers in the UK and Germany. By 1999, the company was also selling consumer electronics, video games, software, home-improvement items, toys and games, and much more.

          Today, Amazon is an ‘everything store’. It also provides other services like Amazon Prime Video, Amazon Alexa, Amazon Robotics and Amazon Prime Now.

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          Foods, cleaning products, personal care items, Unilever has it all. Many of our favourite brands like Pears, Dove, Brooke Bond, Close-Up and Vaseline belong to the Unilever family. Unilever was founded by the Lever brothers in 1885 and it has flooded our markets with a lot of fast moving consumer goods. The company maintained the policy of ‘acquire and grow’ that added more goods to their product line and widened their reach.

          The company has two headquarters- Unilever PLC, based in the United Kingdom, and Unilever N.V., based in the Netherlands. It is one of the oldest multinational companies; Unilever maintains production facilities in 88 countries with products sold in over 190 countries.

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          When it comes to baby products, the first name that comes to most of our minds is Johnson and Johnson. But, the brand name was associated with surgical dressing when it began in 1886.

          Johnson and Johnson was established by Robert Johnson, James Johnson and Edward Johnson in New Jersey, after they split from their former company Seabury & Johnson. It was during the same time that Joseph Lister advocated the use of antiseptics and their importance. Johnson brothers were inspired by his speech and decided to start a business in order to create a line of ready-to-use surgical dressings.

          In 1894, they ventured into baby business. Their maternity kits and baby powder became extremely popular. Today, Johnson and Johnson focuses on three main areas: consumer items, medical devices and diagnostics and pharmaceuticals.

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          Both William Procter and James Gamble migrated to the US. Procter made candles while Gamble sold soaps. Their paths crossed as they married sisters Olivia and Elizabeth Norris, which led to the creation of one of the most recognized brands in the world, P&G.

          For their business, Gamble and Procter needed the same raw materials. Their father-in-law suggested a joint venture to avoid competition and the result was P&G. This happened in 1837. The partnership clicked and business flourished. During the Civil War, the company received a single order that widened their reach; the Union Army ordered for soaps and candles.

          After the war, Procter & Gamble achieved a massive growth, thanks to a new product, Tide. It became a top selling brand as detergent replaced soaps. Their product line further expanded with Pampers – the first disposable diaper, Pringles, and many others. Over the years, the company established its reputation internationally.

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          It wouldn’t be wrong to say that half of the men’s wear won’t be in the market if not for PVH. Many brands such as Van Heusen, Tommy Hilfiger, Calvin Klein, Arrow, Warner’s, True & Co., Perry Ellis, Michael Kors and Geoffrey Beene come from the house of PVH.

          In 1881, Moses Phillips and his family started sewing woollen shirts to sell to miners of Pennsylvania under the name M. Phillips & Sons. Around the same time, Dramin Jones, a Prussian immigrant founded a shirt manufacturing company known as D. Jones & Sons. D. Jones & Sons merged with M. Phillips & Sons in 1907 under the name Phillips-Jones.

          Phillips-Jones was in search of a durable collar. Their improvisations ended in the making of a self-foldable collar for which they received a patent in 1919. The first collar-attached shirt was introduced in 1929 and people liked it.

          The meeting between Isaac Phillips and John Van Heusen began a fresh chapter in their history that resulted in their most popular line of shirts- Van Heusen. The company was later renamed as Phillips-Van Heusen in 1957 and PVH in 2011.

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          Cartier’s history is embellished with royal orders for tiaras and other jewellery. No wonder, this French brand was described by King Edward VII as the ‘Jeweller of Kings and King of Jewellers’.

          Cartier’s history dates back to 1847. Louis-Francois Cartier took over his master’s workshop to found Cartier, but it were his grandsons Louis, Pierre and Jacques who popularized the name worldwide. In 1904, Cartier branched out to making watches. This happened following Louis’s friend Alberto Santo’s complaint about the unreliability of pocket watches while flying. Cartier designed a wristwatch that silenced his friend’s complaint. Since then, Cartier launched several new designs that satisfied many customers. Today, Cartier is one of the top of the line luxury brands with 200 stores across 125 countries. It is now a subsidiary of Richmond Group, a Swiss concern.

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          The luxury brand Prada had its humble beginning at Milan, Italy in 1913 when Mario Prada opened an exclusive store selling handbags, travel trunks, beauty cases and accessories. Due to its high quality and innovative designs, Prada soon became the favourite of Europe’s elite class.

          In 1919, Prada took a step further when it became the official supplier of the Italian royal family. This helped the brand to establish a position that it enjoys even today.

          Prada’s story changed in the 1970s with an epic partnership between Mario Prada’s granddaughter and Tuscan entrepreneur Patrizio Bertelli. This combination of creativity and business resulted in an international expansion of the brand. Prada’s store set the standard for luxury by blending the classic with the modern. Prada also expanded their product line to include women’s footwear, eyewear, perfumes and clothing.

          In 1988, Prada opened their stores in New York and Madrid, followed by London, Paris and Tokyo. In 2016, Prada took another leap with opening an online store.

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          At the age of sixteen, the young Louis Vuitton began his career as an apprentice of a craftsman. It was the 1830s, and people travelled in trains and horse carriages and their luggage was handled roughly. This required tight packing with quality material. Vuitton was fast to learn the skill to design customized trunks.

          After gaining considerable amount of experience, Vuitton started his own business in 1854. He came up with waterproof canvas designs that best suited voyages. Vuitton’s canvas designs were in great demand and his business flourished.

          By 1913, Louis Vuitton became one of the largest travel goods manufacturers. Thanks to the efforts of George Vuitton, his son who took charge after Louis’s death, the brand became international and in 1997, they introduced their first line of clothing for both men and women. The 2000s were a period of expansion for the company; it branched out to produce jewellery, sunglasses, shoes and watches. For many years now, this brand has been one of the most valuable luxury brands of the world.

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          If Levi Strauss created a jeans revolution in the US, it was Lee Cooper who made jeans a household name in the UK. Over the years, Lee Cooper became the go-to-brand of the British Rock and Roll bands and music lovers. In fact, it was Lee Cooper who first identified the connection between music and fashion and Harold Cooper made sure his brand stood for it.

          Lee Cooper began its journey in 1908 in East London. Morris Cooper, Harold’s father and the founder began his business by selling denims to factory workers, much like Levi Strauss. His company was called The Morris Cooper Factory and it soon built a strong reputation amongst customers.

          It was Harold who established the company as Lee Cooper. He worked with legendary artists including the Rolling Stones, UB40, Serge Gainsbourg and Rod Stewart to link denims with music. His attempt fetched good results and soon, denim became a lifestyle element of the youth. Harold also released the first women’s jeans with a front zip. This historic launch was followed by products like coloured jeans, the ones with five pockets and a clothing range inspired by The Beatles.

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          It was the 1850s and the Californian Gold Rush drew people around the world to America. Levi Strauss too migrated to the US hoping to make a fortune. He started his business by selling dry goods to the miners under the name Levi Strauss & Co. In those days, miners were in need of durable pants to wear for work.

            To fill this gap, Levi hired a tailor to make durable pants out of tent canvas. Later, the tent canvas was substituted with more comfortable denim. His tailor Jacob Davis found out that if copper rivets were added to the stitching of pocket seams, the trousers will be more durable. The miners liked the new overalls that Levi produced and soon he got the patent for the new design. The demand increased and his design soon became one of the best-selling clothing items of the world.

             After the First World War, this work wear underwent transformation. In 1934, the company introduced jeans for women and two years later, they started using a Red Tab to the back pocket to distinguish Levi’s jeans from others. By the 1950s, it became more of a fashion statement than work wear. Apart from jeans, Levi Strauss started producing jackets, shirts, skirts, and belts. The company expanded to other countries and as a means of cutting down the costs, many of the factories in the US were closed down.

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               For fashion lovers, Gucci is a familiar name. Guccio Gucci was working as a hotel employee in Paris and London. He was always fascinated by the high quality luggage that his guests used to bring with them and visited H J Cave & Sons, a famous manufacturer to see how they were produced. He soon returned to Florence, his birth place to start a business of his own.

                By 1920, he established a shop that sold leather goods. His products were distinctly known for their fine leather work and classy styling. His business grew and he expanded his product line to include footwear, clothing and other accessories.

                By the 1950s, Gucci had established itself as a premier luxury brand. The brand continued to prosper through the 70s. Today, Gucci is the highest selling Italian fashion brand.

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          More than a hundred years ago, when a young Hans Wilsdorf began making watches, he was looking for making an impenetrable case that could fit all watch mechanisms. In those days, wrist watches were not so popular and his quest was seen as nearly impossible. But his hard work resulted in the production of some of the world’s finest watches known for their quality- Rolex.

          Hans’s efforts were funded by his brother-in-law Alfred Davis. In 1905, Hans brought out his first collection under the name Wilsdorf and Davis. Three years later, Hans came up with the name Rolex. The company was relocated from London to Switzerland due to wartime exigencies. Hans was obsessed with creating watches that withstood external forces and as a result, Rolex continued their innovations.

          In 1926, Rolex created the Oyster collection, the world’s first waterproof and dustproof watch. Years later in 1945, they launched Rolex Datejust, the first self-winding chronometer that indicated the date in a window on the dial. Rolex is also credited for the first wristwatch to display two time zones at once and the first wristwatch to earn chronometer certification.

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          Aviators of the US army played a major role during the war years. As the airmen flew at great heights, they started getting headaches and other ailments due to the intensity of the sky colours. US Army Air Corps Colonel John A. Macready commissioned a New York-based medical equipment manufacturer Bausch & Lomb, to create aviation sunglasses that would get rid of these problems.

          Bausch & Lomb developed a sunglass with plastic frame and green lenses that solved the problem without affecting visibility. It was known as Anti-Glare. This happened in 1929 and a year later, it was patented as Ray-Ban after redesigning it with a metal frame. Each model that was released later became popular in no time. After the war, these sunglasses were made available to the public. In 1999, Bausch & Lomb sold the brand to Luxottica Group, an Italian eyewear conglomerate.

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          Nine years after its establishment, Blue Ribbon Sports was renamed as Nike Inc., one of the most sought-after sports brands. This happened in 1971 and since then, Nike bears the Swoosh mark which makes it one of the most recognizable logos.

          The story of Nike starts in 1964. Bill Bowman was a track and field coach who was looking for ways to improve the performance of his students. Though he tried different ways to develop safe and comfortable shoes, he was not successful in his attempts. Around the same time, his former student Phil Knight suggested an idea to import shoes from Japan to compete with the well-established German brands. The duo started Blue Ribbon Sports, a retail shoe store that later grew to Nike Inc.

          As the sales increased, they decided to manufacture shoes instead of just retailing them. Along with constantly improving the quality and performance of their shoes, they took the help of celebrities like Roger Federer to promote the product. Nike also managed to acquire several small companies and that furthered their success. Slowly they began to expand to other areas like football, golf and clothing. Clever investments and effective marketing along with quality have made Nike one of the most valued sports brands.

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          Adidas earned global attention at the 1936 Berlin Olympics, when the American athlete Jesse Owens sprinted to the finishing line in a pair of Adidas track shoes. Owens won four medals that year, all wearing Adidas shoes.

          Adolph Dassler, the man behind the initial designs of Adidas was an avid football player who wanted to design a new shoe with better performance. His father was a cobbler. Combining his knowledge about the needs on the ground and the expertise of a cobbler, he came out with spiked shoes for track and field. This happened in 1920 and in 1924; he started a shoe company named Adidas T along with his brother Rudolph. Since then, Adidas showed a steady growth.

          Along with shoes, Adidas also brought a range of other sports goods like football and sports apparel. Things were not so good between the brothers after a few years and they split by 1948. Rudolph later went on to establish Puma.

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           Intel’s story is not similar to other technology giants. Neither did it begin in a garage by technology geeks, nor did it face a problem of funds. Intel’s founders, Robert Noyce and Gordon Moore were reputed middle-aged techies with enough experience in the field. When Intel started in 1968, the company received a funding of $2.5 million from Arthur Rock, an American financier.

           Intel started business with memory chips. The company is credited with the world’s first metal oxide semiconductor, the 1101. Though it was not a hit, its successor dynamic random-access memory (DRAM) chip did well in the market.

          DRAM was the first chip that could store a significant amount of information. Moreover, DRAM was cheaper. Soon, it became the standard memory device in computers worldwide.

          The company went public in 1971. Intel reached new heights with the launch of erasable programmable read-only memory chip-the EPROM.

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          The name IBM is a hundred years old. In 1911 The Tabulating Machine Company, the International Time Recording Company, and the Computing Scale Company of America, three successful 19th-century companies merged, giving shape to Computing Tabulating Recording Company. It was renamed as International Business Machines Corporation or IBM in 1924, after Thomas J Watson joined as the CEO.

          Watson just did not change the name of the company; his efforts made IBM one of the world’s leading computer manufacturers. Right from the beginning, IBM was regarded more for its research than its products. The company has a diverse product line, including anything from mainframe computers to personal computers.

          After their success with calculators, IBM started producing their own computers in the 1950s. The company also partnered with Microsoft and Intel for some of their major products. Automated teller machine (ATM), floppy disk, hard disk drive (HDD), and magnetic stripe card are some of the prominent inventions from the house of IBM.

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          When IBM was getting ready to release their first personal computer, the IBM PC, Microsoft was famous for Altair BASIC, International Business Machines Corporation (IBM) approached Microsoft to produce an operating system for their new product. This happened in 1980.

          For IBM’s requirement, Microsoft purchased an existing operating system from another company. They modified and renamed it as MS-DOS (Microsoft Disk Operating System). The new operating system was released in 1981 and met with enormous success. Thereafter, most manufacturers of personal computers licensed MS-DOS as their operating system. Microsoft generated large revenue and never stopped growing thereafter.

          The jewel in their crown, The Microsoft Windows operating system was released in 1983. This new product made Gates a billionaire at the age of 31. With the introduction of Surface tablets that ran Windows RT and Windows 8 Pro in 2012, they started the manufacture of computing hardware.

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          Bill Gates and Paul Allen were best of friends from childhood. Both shared a passion for computers. In those days, computers were not easily accessible for kids as they are today. They used to skip classes to spend time in the school computer room to understand its programming.

          After school, Gates went to Harvard to study law, while Allen started to work as a programmer in Boston. Not long after, Gates returned to work on computers. Around the same time, Altair 8800, a new micro-computer hit the market, Gates and Allen worked to improve its programming language; they worked on BASIC and came up with Altair BASIC.

          This incident inspired the friends to start a company of their own. The result was Microsoft, one of the world’s largest developers of personal-computer software systems and applications.

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          Most of us who use laptops and PCs would be familiar with the brand Dell. But how many of you know that the computer giant Dell was started by a then University student from Austin?

          In 1984, Michael Dell started his business in a dormitory in the University of Texas. He began with providing customized upgrades for PCs. When his business turned profitable, he dropped out of college to build PCs of his own. A year later, he released Turbo PC, his first design. His initial sales were through advertisements and mails. Dell also provided good customer support, sending technicians to service PCs and implementing a policy of risk-free returns. Dell went public in 1988 and the years that followed were a success saga by itself.

          Dell’s first colour notebook computer went on sale in 1991 and in 1994; Dell was the first company to offer long-lasting lithium-ion batteries. In the beginning of the 21st century, Dell’s product line expanded to include televisions, printers, DJ digital audio players, digital cameras, and a variety of computer-related products and the company was renamed as Dell Inc. in 2003.

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          Jobs was forced out of the company over disagreements with John Scully, Apple’s CEO. This happened in 1985, right after the success of Macintosh. But this did not shatter him. He went on to found another computer and software company, NeXT Inc. that later bought Apple. A sweet revenge indeed!

          Apple showed a steady growth after Steve Jobs bought the company. The 1990s were a period of rapid growth. The company introduced newer versions of Macintosh and also launched the PowerBook, the earliest version of Apple’s laptop. Most of the iconic products of Apple were released after that including the iMac, and iPhone. The first iPhone was released in 2007. It came with many innovative features and was an instant success in the market. The subsequent years witnessed the release of newer, better models.

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          Steve Jobs is more like a household name for anyone who knows about computers. But have you heard of Steve Wozniak., Jobs’s friend? The Steves began a start-up in a garage in California that grew to be one of the most successful companies in the world- Apple Inc.

         Both Jobs and Wozniak were college dropouts who wanted to develop a user-friendly personal computer. Wozniak’s work resulted in the development of Apple 1, their first model. This happened in 1976. A year later, they introduced Apple 2, their next PC. Though some of their models were not well received, they never stopped working hard.

          It was in 1984 that they introduced Macintosh, a PC with a built-in screen and mouse. This Product changed the way computers began to be used. Later, they went on to produce laptops, iPods and iPhones.

          Though Panasonic was known as a brand much before, it began to be known as a company only in 2008. Panasonic is the new name of Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd.

          Konosuke Matsushita started Panasonic in 1918. Twenty-three -year old Matsushita had two workers- his young wife and her 15-year old brother. Their business started with fan insulator plates. The product was reliable and cheaper than the others available in the market. By the end of the year, he had twenty employees.

          The journey was not so easy for Matsushita. His business was affected by the World War, but he made a fortune out of the post-War boom. From 1945 through 1959, Panasonic began producing black-and-white TVs, washing machines, refrigerators, radios, rice cookers and home air conditioners. By 1950, the company expanded globally.

          The company changed its name to Panasonic in 2008 and teamed up with Tesla in 2014. Panasonic is now a global technology leader.

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          Though Canon possessed advanced technology, the company had a weak marketing section. Their success in engineering was countered by weak marketing strategies. This affected their products.

          In 1972, Canon developed the “liquid dry” copying system, the first of its kind in the market. Instead of selling the new product on their own, Canon licensed the technology to other manufacturers because the company doubted its competence in the market. This wasted a huge opportunity for profit. Things changed when Ryuzaburo Kaku stepped in.

          Kaku joined Canon as the managing director who changed the company’s management and marketing strategies, including TV commercials and faster development of newer technologies. By the 1970s and 1980s Canon launched a range of new products like EOS (electronic optical system) and autofocus SLR that brought them back into profitable business.

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          Canon, the company that produces some of the world’s best cameras was started by a gynecologist. Back in 1933, Takeshi Mitarai, a gynecologist worked to develop cameras for medical use.

          Mitarai began the Precision Optical Instruments Laboratory for this, but the applications of their first major product extended well beyond the medical field. In 1934, they made Kwanon, Japan’s first 35 millimetre camera.

          Years later, they came out with Japan’s first indirect X-ray camera. Though their products were successful in the market, the Second World War hindered their growth. But another war provided an international break-through for Canon. It was during the Korean War that people recognized the quality of the Japanese lenses.

          Soon, the company began making huge profits. Its name changed to Canon Camera Company Inc in 1947. Canon continued to grow and in 1959, it became the first company in the world to manufacture an 8-millimetre camera with a built-in zoom lens. The company branched out to manufacture other products including the all-electronic hand-held calculator, electronic typewriter and plain-paper copier.

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          It was 1886. Robert Bosch was neither rich, nor famous when he began his work to produce magnetos -a machine that provides current for ignition- in a workshop in his backyard.

          A year later, he came up with his first low voltage magneto for gas engines. In a few years, Bosch became the supplier of reliable ignition machinery within the industry. They rose to a global stature in 1897 and became a corporation in 1917.

         The company also started making windshield wipers and car radios. During the Second World War, they had to produce accessories for German Luftwaffe aircraft. During the war years, no new German tank was ever made without the starter elements from the Bosch factory.

          Apart from automobile accessories, as well as power tools, additional products like household appliances, helped Bosch achieve long-term stability.

          Bosch is credited with the development of a range of important inventions like the oxygen sensor, the electric motor control, the traction control system, the xenon light for cars, the electronic stability control and the direct fuel injection.

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          The Tsar of Russia chose Philips to light up his palace as they produced reliable and cost-effective electric bulbs.

          In 1891, Frederik Philip decided to fund his son Gerard’s dream project to make quality light bulbs for everyone who needed them and thus, Philips was born. After twenty five years of production of carbon filament bulbs, Philips gained royal recognition after which they decided to branch out.

          The company was concerned about the well-being of people and soon got into the medical field, producing X-ray radiation equipment. Around the same time, they began producing radios. The work experience with radios helped them in the manufacture of television. Their product line diversified and started to include Philishave- the revolutionary electric shaver, CDs, DVDs, and so on.

          By the 1990s, Philips channelled their attention towards healthcare. They also produce a range of products like electric kettle, trimmers, and hair straighteners.

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          Nokia introduced the world’s first mobile phone. The company took shape in 1865 in Finland. Fredrik Ides-tam started his business with a paper mill. Later, he branched out to electronics. In 1979, Nokia joined hands with Finnish TV maker Salora to develop the world’s first international cellular network- the Nordic Mobile Telephone (NMT) service.

          Five years later Nokia launched the Mobira Cityman, the first mobile phone. Though heavy and overpriced, it soon became a status symbol and Nokia made huge profits. The iconic Nokia ringtone was released in 1994 with the launch of Nokia 2100. By 1998, the company’s turnover increased by a massive 500 per cent. But, things began to change by 2007. The company started to run at a loss and was later acquired by Microsoft. Still, Nokia is remembered for some of the most memorable phones.

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          Samsung entered the electronics industry in 1969; it first produced black-and-white televisions which helped to establish it as a major brand, not only in Korea, but overseas as well. The decades that followed were marked with rapid expansion. Samsung came out with a range of products including refrigerators, computers, washing machines, microwave ovens and fax machines that helped the company in securing a position in the global market.

          Their mobile phone business began to invest heavily in research and development throughout the 1980s. The 2000s were a game changer for Samsung. Samsung’s Galaxy smartphone series hit the market. Soon, the series became the company’s most-praised product and frequently topped the annual lists of the best-selling smartphones in the world. The Galaxy series expanded into tablets in 2010.

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         Samsung started off as a grocery trading store in 1938. Lee Byung-Chull, the founder began his business by trading noodles, dried fish and vegetables. After the Korean War, he started a textile mill, thereby expanding his business. From the beginning, his strategy was to diversify and expand. Soon, he stepped into construction work, logistics and insurance and Lee met with success in all his endeavours.

          The Korean economy would suffer a major backlash if Samsung decides to leave business forever. Samsung is branched out into four major sections including electronics, engineering, construction, and most high-tech products. Samsung Group now have their presence in almost eighty fields including textiles, ship building, aerospace manufacture, oil mining, construction works, high-polymer chemicals, genetic engineering tools, telecommunications and nanotechnology.

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          The tape recorder was just a starter in Sony’s menu. In 1957, Sony introduced the world’s first direct-view portable TV, the TV8-30. They kept modifying their television designs for better performance, but the best was yet to come.

          In 1979, Sony launched a product that changed their history and revolutionized music- Sony Walkman. It answered the need for a portable personal sound stereo. The new stereo came with headphones, so that one could listen to music anywhere without disturbing others. As the product hit the market, every music lover dreamt of owning a Walkman.

          Walkman was followed by Discman, a portable CD player, Handycam, High Definition Handycam, an upgraded version of Handycam and many others. Sony is also a major player in the music and film industries. Sony Music and Sony Pictures divisions dominate the world entertainment industry.

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          When Masaru Ibuka and Akio Morita started their business from scratch, they did not possess anything except the readiness to work hard. It was 1946 and Japan had still not recovered from the effects of war. Their drive for success came from this national situation. The two started their company Tokyo Telecommunications Engineering Corp. in a bombed out departmental store.

          Both Ibuka and Morita were friends from the army. Ibuka was a genius in product development and Morita had commendable management skills. They began with making electric rice cookers which was not so successful. After some experiments, they came out with a tape recorder. The Japanese loved this invention and the sales sky-rocketed. As they decided to go international in 1958, they changed the company’s name to Sony, a combination of ‘sonus’ the Latin word for sound and the American word ‘sonny’.

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               It all began in 1893, with Caleb Bradham inventing a new formula for a sweetened drink. His new drink was initially called ‘Brad’s drink’. As the business caught on, he looked for a quirkier name and settled with Pepsi-Cola.

               Though Pepsi-Cola was a successful brand, Caleb Bradham eventually went bankrupt. The company, after passing through the hands of several investors was finally bought by Charles G Guth. This happened in 1931 and after years of hardships, Pepsi made an amazing comeback in the 1960s.

                Pepsi became the first US product to be produced and sold within the USSR in 1974. The company diversified further with the purchase of Pizza Hut Inc., Taco Bell Inc., KFC and Seven-Up International. The brand was later renamed as PepsiCo and acquired more brands including Tropicana, Quaker, Lipton and Gatorade. PepsiCo now serves beverages and snacks to the whole world.

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          Have you ever thought that it’s too late to begin something? Well, if Colonel Sanders thought so, we wouldn’t have the world’s most famous fried chicken-KFC!

          A forty-year-old Colonel Sanders began selling fried chicken for hungry travellers after the Second World War. He had a store near a gas station and soon travellers started to fill their tummies along with their petrol tanks, making his chicken famous. He later franchised his business across America, but his recipe remained a secret. He also patented a method of preparation that involved frying chicken under pressure.

          By 1964, his franchise became too large for him to manage and he sold KFC to a group of investors led by John Y. Brown, Jr. and Jack C. Massey. After a series of ownership changes, KFC is currently owned by Yum Brands. It is the world’s second-largest restaurant chain after McDonald’s and Colonel Sanders still remains the iconic face of KFC.

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          In the 1930s, one of the issues that troubled the Brazilian government was their surplus coffee produce. They did not know what to do with huge sacks of unsold coffee until Nestle offered them a solution. Thanks to Max Morgenthaler and three years of his research, we now enjoy the invigorating flavour of Nescafe.

          Max was committed to come up with an instant coffee mixture that retained its natural flavour, but was easy to make. He succeeded in creating a powdered variety that made tasty coffee by simply mixing water. He named it Nescafe by combining the first three letters of Nestle with the word Cafe.

          The Second World War was a major game changer for Nescafe. Nescafe became a part of the food rations of the US forces and they loved it. The brand grew through the 1940s with export to many countries. Today, Nescafe is enjoyed in 180 countries.

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          Pharmacist Henri Nestle was troubled thinking about malnutrition that affected many babies in Switzerland. Many mothers were not able to breastfeed their babies as they were away because of work. He worked on creating something that would be tasty and nutritious at the same time.

          After a considerable number of trials, Henri came out with a formula made of milk, flour and sugar. He tested this on a malnourished child whose health improved after its consumption.

          This happened in the 1860s. Soon, Henri opened a factory to produce this infant formula- Farine Lacte Henri Nestle. Later, he sold the company to Jules Monneret who worked for the further growth of the company.

          Around the same time, another company known as the Anglo-Swiss Condensed Milk Company competed with Nestle, but the competition did not last long. The two merged in 1905. A year later, they began making chocolates.

          Nestle withstood both World War I and II. By 1945, it became an international brand with factories in several Latin American countries and continued to prosper.

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         Julius Maggi was a Swiss miller who took over his father’s business. It was the 1880s; Europe was increasingly industrialized with more and more women joining the workforce. These working women found it difficult to get enough time to cook nutritious food for their families. Julius Maggi wanted to provide healthy and delicious food supplies for these working women.

          He worked to create new flour from pulses. After two years of research, he introduced powdered pea and bean flours in 1884, followed by one of the world’s first instant soups. His products were a huge success that revolutionized the way millions cooked in the years that followed.

          Julius Maggi invested a lot of money in advertising and exploited the possibilities of advertising on public transport. Maggi vans gave out free samples of hot soups and also did poster campaigns. A brand like Maggi was quick to grow and become international. In 1947, it was acquired by Nestle, another Swiss brand with the same visionary approach towards food.

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          Dominos is the first thing that comes to our mind when we think of pizza. This international brand started when two brothers James and Tom Monaghan decided to run an outlet of DomiNick’s, a chain pizza restaurant. Soon, James, who was not so interested in the pizza business, sold his share to Tom for a second-hand Volkswagen Beetle.

          Tom later purchased two more pizzerias. Though Tom wanted to use the brand name DomiNick’s, the original owner forbade him to do so. One of Tom’s helpers Jim Kennedy suggested the name Domino’s which he accepted without a second thought. Thus, Domino’s Pizza was born in 1965.

          For the next fifteen years, Domino’s followed a traditional model of business; they only delivered pizzas and had a limited menu. Their menus started including non-pizza items only from the 1990s. Since then, there have been more innovations like dine-in restaurants and pizza cars.

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          Starbucks was started by three friends who met in the University, who shared the love for coffee and tea. English teacher Jerry Baldwin, history teacher Zev Siegl, and writer Gordon Bowker were fascinated by the coffee seller Alfred Peet’s roasting techniques and brewing skills.

          Drawing inspiration from Peets, they decided to open a coffee outlet that sold quality roasted coffee beans. After considering some names, they chose ‘Starbuck’, the name of the first mate in Moby Dick, because they thought that the name starting with ‘st’ had some special power.

          When they started the company in Seattle in 1971, they only sold roasted whole coffee beans and did not yet brew coffee to sell. The only brewed coffee served in the store was free samples as most of their customers did not know much about their products. The credit for the introduction of Starbucks cafe lies with Howard Schultz.

          Schultz bought Starbucks in 1982 as a marketing head. Schultz brought Starbucks when Baldwin and Bowker decided to sell it in 1987 and introduced the cafe style of business. It was an instant hit, followed by a period of rapid expansion. Starbucks soon became the world’s largest public coffee-house chain.

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          Quaker Oats Company, whose history dates back to the mid-1880s is famous not for the brand name alone, but also for its trademark. The trademark was registered by Henry Seymour and William Heston, the former owners of Quaker Oats, who sold it to Henry Parsons Crowell due to bankruptcy. Quaker has long been the icon of a healthy breakfast. The name was chosen as it projected values like honesty and integrity.

          Four oatmeal business pioneers- Ferdinand Schumacher, John Stuart, George Douglas, and Henry Parsons Crowell-formed the American Cereal Company in the mid-1880s that used the Quaker trademark. They were producing oats and wheat cereals, corn meal, baby food, and animal feed while management conflicts broke out. Dirty ownership fights led to a split that gave shape to the Quaker Oats Company with Crowell as its president.

          Throughout its history, Quaker had bought and sold several brands that changed the profile of the company. By the 1980s, Quaker sold off its non-food operations. It is owned by Pepsico since 2001.

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          Golden arches, the clown with red and yellow stripes, and burgers. This would make you think only of McDonald’s, the brand that revolutionized the modern fast food business.

          The world’s largest restaurant chain started in California in 1948, when two brothers, Richard and Maurice McDonald decided to seek their fortune by selling hamburgers and hotdogs. But it was nowhere close to the McDonald’s that we know today. The brothers focused on providing quick bites for the people on the road. Their meeting with salesman Ray Kroc however, changed all this.

          Ray Kroc was impressed by their technique of creating large quantities of food at a low price. Seeing a great business opportunity, he decided to invest in the brothers and offered them a franchise program in 1945.

          The chain expanded and within ten years, McDonald’s went international. Eventually, Ray Kroc bought out the brothers from McDonald’s Corporation. But he retained the name as it had got ingrained to the burgers they sold.

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          Baskin-Robbins started with two ice cream lovers who happened to be brothers-in-law. As a teenager, Irvine Robbins used to work in his father’s ice cream shops while Burton Baskin made ice creams for his colleagues in the US navy. Both of them had separate ice cream shops before they decided to be partners. The passion for creating new flavours brought them close.

          In 1945, they decided to merge their shops to form the world-renowned ice cream store- Baskin Robbins. They expanded gradually and began franchising by hiring managers. In 1949, they purchased their first dairy production unit in California. This was the beginning of the ice cream revolution. They experimented with new ingredients and flavours, bringing out more varieties. The idea was to create a different flavour for each day of a month. Right now, they have more than 1300 flavours in their assortment. They still continue to come up with a new ‘Flavour of the Month’ each month along with other creative ice creams and cake designs.

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          In 1919, Ernest Woodruff bought the company and ran Coca-Cola for the next 60 years. Nothing was the same ever again.

          He is responsible for bottling the beverage. He popularized these bottles so much, that people slowly started forgetting the soda fountains. He is also responsible for many other innovations like the metal-topped coolers, and coin-operated Coke vending machines.

          Woodruff took great efforts in marketing Coke overseas. Woodruff also created links between Coca-Cola and the U.S. military. At the outbreak of World War II, he swore that American servicemen would be able to get a cold Coca-Cola everywhere the war took them. They took Coke everywhere they went and even though the soldiers returned, Coke remained behind. Today, Coca-Cola is sold virtually everywhere in the world.

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          Coca-Cola is quintessentially American and its history dates back to 1886. It all began with the curiosity of Dr. John S. Pemberton, a pharmacist from Atlanta. He wanted to make a soft drink that could be sold in the soda fountains, famous during that time.

          He succeeded in making a flavoured syrup of distinct taste. It tasted good when mixed with carbonated water. People who tasted it instantly liked it. His friend Frank M Robinson suggested the name Coca-Cola which soon became an iconic brand. The story of Coca-Cola begins here.

          Coca-Cola was an instant hit in the market. Soon, the soda fountains were crowded with Coke customers. Within two years of its creation, a major part of its shares was sold to Asa Candler under whom, Coca-Cola expanded. He invested considerably in promotion campaigns. As a result, the demand increased and distribution chains grew. Looking at the possibilities of expansion, the company started to bottle the drink. The drink soon began to be associated with happiness and any occasion was felt to be incomplete without it.

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          Bournville took its birth from the expansion plans of Cadbury. In 1879, Richard and George decided to build a new factory. Those days, factories were no different from dungeons. Richard and George Cadbury wanted to build something better for their workers, and Bournville was built on a fourteen acre plot.

          Unlike other factories, it had warm rooms to dry clothes and places to heat food. The brothers also built a workers’ village around the factory. Each house had a garden big enough to grow vegetables. Workers were also provided with recreation facilities like football and cricket fields for the men and boys, and a playground and a garden with a lily pond for the wives and daughters.

          The workers were given good wages, medical treatment and pension. Bournville was a multi-purpose factory site. During World War II, the company converted parts of the factory into workrooms to manufacture equipment like pilot seats for fighter planes.

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          The sweetness of Cadbury is 195 years old. It all started in Birmingham, when a young John Cadbury opened a grocery shop in 1824, where he sold tea, coffee and drinking chocolate.

          Right from the beginning, John was concerned with finding an alternative for alcohol. He strongly believed that drinking ruined many families. He invested all his hopes in his chocolate drink and it soon gained popularity.

          By 1831, he decided to expand the business and started producing a range of drinking chocolates and cocoas. Luckily for him, the heavy tax on cocoa was cut down significantly, which made his cocoa products affordable to the masses.

          In 1854, Queen Victoria issued them their first Royal Warrant. But, luck did not always favour John. The death of his second wife devastated him; soon he turned towards social work, leaving his company in the hands of his sons, Richard and George.

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          The idea of Volvo cars was conceived in a Swedish ball bearing factory. Assar Gabrielsson was working in the company as a sales manager when his wife died in an accident. This had an impact on him. ‘It’s time to create a safer new car’ he thought.

          Engineer Gustav Larson understood his concern. It snows a lot in Sweden which decreases the friction of the tyres, making driving difficult. The engineers worked with this in mind and in 1927, they came out with a stable car with a highly responsive steering wheel. Their cars were specially noted for their safety features. The cars were a huge success following which Volvo trucks and buses hit the market and were exported across Europe.

          Throughout its history, the ownership of Volvo cars has been transferred from one group to another. It is currently under the Geely Holding Group of China. Other Volvo products including trucks, buses and marine and industrial supplies are owned by AB Volvo.

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          The word Boeing brings to our mind an image of an aircraft. Aviation pioneer William Edward Boeing established Pacific Aero Products Co. in 1916 to manufacture aeroplanes. The company was renamed Boeing a short while after the designing of Model C, their first airplane.

          Boeing started with making planes for military and transportation purposes. Though it dominated the market in the 1920s, the company had a strong rival from the start of the 1930s- McDonnell Douglas Corporation. Boeing came out with some of its best models to compete with Douglas. The company later purchased Douglas in 1997.

          By the end of the 20th century, Boeing produced most of the world’s best sellers till date. Its first wide-body jetliner Boeing 747, capable of carrying 490 passengers held a capacity record for 37 years and over 1,500 such planes were sold.

          Things weren’t always easy for Boeing. The company was nearly bankrupt in the 1970s, but regained sound financial status by the 90s.

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          In 1903, a twenty-year-old William Harley decided to establish a motor company. It was a time when small motorcycle production units were springing across the US. This bold decision was made in a small shack, when he had nothing except a strong will.

          He founded Harley-Davidson along with brothers Arthur and Walter Davidson. A century after their humble start, their brand is still deeply ingrained in the minds of bike lovers, not only in America, but all over the world.

          Their powerful engines and sportive design helped Harley-Davidson to secure a place in the market. They were the first to produce a catalogue for a motor vehicle in the world. William Davidson joined the company in 1907 and the next decade saw rapid growth. The company produced bikes for the US army during both the World Wars.

          Within a span of 20 years, the company expanded to become the largest motorcycle manufacturer in the world, supplying bikes to 67 countries. Their performance based models like Electra Glide and V-Rod dominate the roads today.

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          Jeep is a truly American brand. Its journey began in 1940. The Second World War was gaining momentum and the US military was looking for a lightweight vehicle that could traverse all terrains in any season. The army contacted 135 companies for this purpose.

          The American Bantam Car Company came out with a prototype which was later modified by Willys. Willys developed a four-wheeler military vehicle named ‘Quad’ which fought the American Wars alongside the soldiers. Almost 300,000 Willys Quads were in military use and it was not available for the civilians until 1945.

          Kaiser Motors bought Willys in 1953. It was then named Kaiser-Jeep and the company came out with more civilian models like Wagoner which lived by the slogan ‘go anywhere, do anything’.

          Jeep was bought by Chrysler in 1987. The 1990s saw an explosion of interest in SUVs, and Jeep took advantage of the public’s enthusiasm by introducing premium models like Grand Cherokee. The company is now owned by is Fiat Chrysler Automobiles (FCA).

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          When the German government proposed the Volkswagen project, the dream of their leaders was to produce affordable cars for the masses that would make transportation easy. The German government founded “Gesellschaft zur Vorbereitung des Deutsche Volkswagens mbH” in 1937. Later that year, they changed this quite lengthy name to Volkswagens mbH.

          Initially, the company was operated by a Nazi organization called the German Labour Front. Ferdinand Porsche, an Austrian automotive engineer and the founder of Porsche Car Company, provided the design for this people’s car. Though popular, Volkswagen had to stop its production during World War II. By June 1945, the British Military Government took over Volkswagen.

          The mass production of the Volkswagen Beetle started under the management of Major Ivan Hirst. An advertisement campaign that focused on the advantages of the compact size of the car gave a boost for Beetle in the United States.

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          During World War II, BMW supplied aircraft and motor cycles for the German military. But once the Nazi army was defeated, the Allied forces dismantled all of BMW’s plants due to their role in producing war materials.

          The company was nearly ruined. BMW did not have even a single manufacturing plant. To stay in business, BMW sold kitchen utensils. Surviving the backlash, BMW bounced back in 1951, producing its first ever automobile after the war. The model 501 could seat six people comfortably and was marketed as a luxury car. This put BMW back on track and re-established its reputation as a vehicle manufacturer.

          The company achieved a steady growth in the next fifteen years. Over the decades, the company started manufacturing sports cars. It was a huge hit following which the BMW Motorsport subsidiary introduced new lineups such as the BMW Mountains, Yachtsport, and Golfsport.

          In 1994, BMW acquired the British-based Rover Group, which is best known for sports vehicles. Later in 1998, BMW purchased the Rolls-Royce group.

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          On 28 October, 1913, a German technical designer named Karl Rapp founded Rapp-Motoren-werke. He started off with manufacturing aircraft engines. However, the engines were not efficient enough. Karl Rapp’s financial struggles began there.

         During the First World War, Karl Rapp got an order of 600 airplane engines from the Prussian army which put him back in business. He eventually formed a partnership with business owner Fran-Josef Popp who appointed new engineers to modify the engines. The effort was not in vain. The engine performance became better and by 1917, the company was renamed as Bayerische Motoren Werke (BMW).

          By 1923, BMW started experimenting with new designs and branched out to producing motor cycles. They also began building the whole vehicle instead of engines alone. For a company in its infancy, this was a huge step.

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      There is an interesting tale about a Maharaja who used the iconic Rolls-Royce as a garbage vehicle. Once, Maharaja Jai Singh of Alwar went on a visit to London. During his stay in the city, he visited the Rolls-Royce showroom. He asked the staff there about the specifications of the car, but they made fun of him and ignored his request for a test drive. Little did they know that the man dressed in ordinary clothes was one of the wealthiest rulers of India. A furious Maharaja went back and visited the showroom again, this time in all royal splendous. He was welcomed with a red carpet and staff treated him with utmost respect. After spending two hours in the showroom, the Maharaja bought all the six cars displayed there, that too in single payment. He shipped the cars back to India and to insult Rolls-Royce, used them to sweep the roads and collect the garbage in his province.

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          Rolls-Royce is undoubtedly the supreme symbol of luxury. Even today, the company puts enormous efforts to keep its cars unique.

          Almost 65 per cent of all Rolls-Royce cars ever made are still on the road today. Rolls-Royce cars are still individually made, as they do not use any mechanical aid to build engines. They only use bull leather to make the seat covers. The coach line or pinstripes of the cars are still hand-painted, and no machines or robots are used in this process.

          The company even used to have a chauffeur training programme to teach the driving etiquettes. It was known as the White Glove training programme where drivers were even taught how to open and close the doors with minimal fingerprints. One of the Rolls-Royce models was made exclusively for the heads of State and Royalty. No wonder, Rolls-Royce is still the indisputable icon of luxury.

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          Rolls-Royce is the product of a phenomenal partnership between two innovative men. Charles Rolls and Henry Royce had nothing in common except for a passion for the perfect automobile.

          Rolls was a wealthy car dealer in Britain. Royce on the other hand, was a self-made man; he started out as a paper boy and later began an electrical engineering business. He turned to making cars after becoming a successful engineer.

          Henry Edmunds, a mutual friend of Rolls and Royce made the two meet. Edmunds boasted to Rolls about his new 10hp Royce motor car. Rolls badly wanted to meet the man who made the car. He met Royce and after taking a test drive, he instantly agreed to sell as many cars as Royce could build. Rolls made the agreement without any second thoughts on May 4, 1904, as he knew he had found the right motor car with superior performance. Thus, the Rolls-Royce Motor Cars took birth.

          The first Rolls-Royces appeared by the end of 1904. Royce designed and built the cars and Rolls brought them to the public. Rolls-Royce is still the world’s best-known symbol of supreme motoring excellence.

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          Henry Ford has a prominent place in the history of the automobile industry. Without him, mass production of vehicles wouldn’t have been possible.

          It happened in the beginning of the 20th century. In those days, car production was still taking baby steps. It took almost twelve hours to assemble a car and the production costs were very high. Cars were a luxury which could only be afforded by the rich; expensive toys of wealthy people.

          Henry Ford wanted to make quality cars at a low cost, so that a majority of the population could afford them. After careful studies, he identified different stages of making a car. He gave specialized training for workers to work with specific stages. Using a machine similar to a conveyor belt, the cars were moved from one stage to another until all parts were in place. This method came to be known as the assembly line and it significantly reduced the time and cost of making a car. A car could now be made in less than three hours and the price dropped to almost half of the initial cost.

          Cars were no more a luxury item; a common man could finally afford it. Ford’s sale skyrocketed with this technology; at one point, Ford supplied almost 50 per cent of the cars in the US. Ford’s model is the basis of modern day production of cars.

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          Henry Ford had left his family at an early age. He had to support his wife and kids, and ran a saw mill. Later, he joined the Edison Illuminating Company as an engineer. At Edison’s, his work was highly regarded.

          Henry always had a passion for automobiles. He set up a workshop in a shed behind his house, where he put his ideas together to create a car.

          His relentless efforts were not in vain; he first came up with a gasoline-powered carriage which he called the Quadricycle, a carriage supported by four bicycle wheels. He then decided to make a company of his own to make new cars. The result was the Ford Motor Company which came into being in 1903.

          Ford came out with Model A, followed by Model B and Model C. Ford’s Model T met with immediate success in the market. He explored the possibility of mass production. Ford hasn’t stopped making cars for the world ever since. When the Great Depression struck America, 183 out of 200 automobile companies declared bankruptcy, but Ford survived.