Nhà sáng lập của Ikea: làm việc không phải vì mong muốn hưởng thụ giàu có, mà muốn xây dựng một đế chế luôn tìm cách để tiết kiệm tài nguyên, không muốn đóng thuế thu nhập cho các chính phủ, cũng chẳng muốn chia lại nhiều cho con cái. Ông ấy đã cấu trúc Ikea để khi ông ấy chết thì đế chế ấy “tự quản” như kiểu các trường đại học tư ở Mỹ, và vẫn có thể “for profit”.
When Ikea’s Ingvar Kamprad died Saturday at age 91, he was ranked No. 8 on the Bloomberg Billionaires Index thanks to his control of a global retail fortune valued at US$58.7 billion.
His wealth will now be dissipated because of a unique structure put in place by Kamprad to secure the long-term independence and survival of the Ikea concept. Kamprad disputed his status as one of the richest men on the planet, having decades earlier placed control of the world’s largest furniture seller into a network of foundations and holding companies.
Kamprad’s heirs now won’t have direct control of the firm. They will have a more meager fortune derived from family-owned Ikano Group, a collection of finance, real estate, manufacturing and retail businesses which had total assets of about US$10 billion in 2016. Most Ikea stores are owned by the Stichting Ingka Foundation, a Dutch entity with the stated purpose of donating to charity and “supporting innovation” in design, according to its founding statute.
Source: Ikea fortune of $58.7 billion falls to no one after billionaire founder’s death | Financial Post
Đọc thêm: https://www.forbes.com/sites/maxjedeurpalmgren/2018/01/28/ingvar-kamprad-founder-of-ikea-dead-at-91/
Ingvar Kamprad passed away on Saturday in his home in Älmhult, Sweden, following a short illness. The founder of furniture retailer Ikea died at the age of 91 surrounded by his loved ones, according to a statement released by the company.
Kamprad founded IKEA at the age of 17, peddling matches, fish and Christmas cards by bicycle. The company’s name is a combination of the initials of his first and last name, his family farm and the nearest village. He opened his first furniture store in 1947 and built it into one of the world’s largest and most successful retailers, which today has revenues of nearly $46 billion.
Known for his relentless pursuit of efficiency, Kamprad introduced the flat-pack in 1953, then moved production of his cheap chic furniture to Soviet Poland in 1961 to minimize labor costs. On the way to growing his home furnishings empire, he published the Furniture Dealer’s Testament or the “Ikea Bible,” which includes maxims such as “wasting resources is a mortal sin at Ikea.”
Between 2005 and 2010, Kamprad was estimated to be one of the 10 richest people in the world by FORBES, worth as much as $28 billion based largely on the value of Ikea. He ranked as high as number four twice on the World’s Billionaires rankings. His net worth would have been much higher today, probably upwards of $60 billion, had he not denied owning Ikea. In 2011 his net worth fell dramatically after his lawyers presented documents detailing how the ownership of Ikea had been irrevocably transferred to a foundation in tax haven Lichtenstein decades earlier. Interests in banking, real estate and insurance outside of Ikea still earned him a status as billionaire. Forbes removed him from the billionaires list in 2016 after he transferred his assets to three of his sons – Peter, Mathias and Jonas – all of whom are billionaires.
Kamprad famously left Sweden to avoid punitive taxes in 1973. Still, throughout his life Kamprad, who remained chairman until 2013, showed little interest in the trappings of wealth. He reportedly preferred to fly economy and for more than two decades drove a Volvo until he was convinced it was no longer safe. In 2014 he moved back to the outskirts of Älmhult, the rural town close to where he grew up that is home to Ikea’s headquarters. He passed away only a 10-minute drive from the farm on which he was born.