Bir Dünya Kurmak (Building A World): A 72-Year Adventure

“Bir Dünya Kurmak” (Building A World), a biography  written by Mr. Rıdvan Akar, narrates the life story of Mr. Hüsnü Özyeğin, the founder of our University, and reveals Mr. Hüsnü Özyeğin’s secrets to his success in entrepreneurship, philanthropy, and life.

Born 72 years ago as the second child of a middle-class family, Mr. Hüsnü Özyeğin’s life story is now told in his biography  “Bir Dünya Kurmak” (Building A World).  The culmination of an almost 9-year writing process, the book authored by Rıdvan Akar is  now on the shelves in all bookstores through the distribution of D&R.

Revenues from the book will be donated to Özyeğin University’s Equal Opportunities in Education Scholarship Fund. The book narrates Özyeğin’s rise in business with a detailed description of his childhood and teenage years, his education, and his first professional experiences.

His first professional experience: A Tout at the Age of 6

Özyeğin started school at the Fazıl Bey Primary School, Izmir. He then graduated from Robert College, Istanbul, Oregon State University, and Harvard Business School, respectively.

He had his first professional experience working as a tout for his grandfather while he was only six years old. He went to the States to study engineering, with only 1,000 Dollars in his pocket, where he worked as a waiter in order to survive as a student. Later, he served as the Student Union President of his university with a student population of 12,000 students. While he was pursuing his MBA degree at Harvard University, he took over the management of the university cafeteria. Following his graduation, he worked for different companies in the US before he returned home at the age of 29.

His first wealth: His diplomas...

As a fresh graduate who would soon step into his professional career, his wealth was made up of his educational background and diplomas only. Today, Özyeğin is renowned as the doyen of Turkish banking. His success story in the banking industry started  when he was appointed first as a member of the Board of Directors, and then, at the age of 32, the General Manager at Pamukbank.  Soon after, he was named the youngest general manager of  a bank, he also started to serve as the General Manager at Yapı Kredi, which was also owned by  Çukurova Holding. His success story was crowned by his achievement in making both banks profitable through the changes he made with his successful projects. In 1987, he decided to establish his own bank.

He thus launched Finansbank, the first bank ever founded by a banker in Turkey. Finansbank would soon go public and break new grounds in banking, including being Turkey’s first bank to create installments on credit cards.

The largest foreign capital

Remarkably fending off the financial crisis in 1994 and 2001, Hüsnü Özyeğin sold Finansbank to the National Bank of Greece in 2006. Yet, even when he sold his bank, “a world he built” in his own words, he still managed to break a new record by bringing in Turkey the largest foreign capital ever.

And the new destination is Fiba Holding

After selling Finansbank, Hüsnü Özyeğin steered his course towards Fiba Holding, which he founded in 1989. Fiba Holding has thus become his new haven in business to pursue his dreams for growth and institutionalization. Özyeğin’s success in banking, in fact, is just the tip of the iceberg. To date, Hüsnü Özyeğin has also taken his professional experience and success overseas with the investments he has made in many countries from Russia to China, and the Netherlands to Romania. Not only did he scale up his banking activities to own the largest Turkish bank operating in different countries abroad, today Özyeğin also has many other investments under Fiba Holding, from banking to retail and energy to port management. “Facing your failures is the key to success. Because the lessons you get from them are much more important” says Hüsnü Özyeğin, as he shares his failed ventures which yielded losses. Özyeğin’s mind-dazzling pace has not slackened at all, and in fact increased after a series of new social responsibility projects he has undertaken, and his establishment of Özyeğin University.

“The university is my most enjoyable and valuable venture...”

Hüsnü Özyeğin, Turkey’s serial entrepreneur who has  started almost 100 companies in 12 countries to date, established Özyeğin University to make his dreams come true in the field of education.

Always emphasizing that his most enjoyable and valuable investment was the university he founded, Özyeğin says “I have started almost 100 businesses in 12 countries, and I know that I will not be able to start another 100 businesses or build 10 more foundations now. If we can inspire the youth and offer them a good education at Özyeğin University, I believe that their contributions to Turkey would be greater than that of my companies.” 

“True wealth is the wealth of heart.”

When asked what is his most precious asset in life, Özyeğin always answers “my family”. Today, Özyeğin runs Fiba Holding together with his children Murat and Ayşecan. Özyeğin says his wife Mrs. Ayşen Özyeğin is his source of inspiration for social responsibility projects.

Özyeğin has topped the Turkey’s wealthiest persons list many times. Once when asked “How does it feel to be Turkey’s wealthiest person?”, he answered “The actual list that needs to be published is the list of the wealthiest persons in heart”, and he emphasized that today his greatest achievement was to touch on one and a half million people’s lives with his social investments.