6. Steve Jobs
Co-founder, chairman, and CEO of Apple Inc
Started with a purchase order for computers that hadn’t been built
Steve Jobs famously financed Apple by securing a purchase order for 50 non-existent computers from the owner of The Byte Shop in California. He approached the local computer store who said they would only be interested in the machine if it came fully assembled. Jobs then took the purchase order to Cramer Electronics, a national electronic parts distributor, and ordered the components he needed to assemble the Apple I Computer.
The local credit manager asked Jobs how he was going to pay for the parts and he replied, “I have this purchase order from the Byte Shop chain of computer stores for 50 of my computers and the payment terms are COD.” Jobs’ tenacity paid off. He received the line of credit to pay for the parts and so Apple was born.