Who are the successful entrepreneurs?

They started their business around the world, and made millions of dollars. A study by BNP Paribas Wealth Management, the first of its kind, looks at what made them successful, their careers and their ambitions.

• With an average of 4.5 companies and an average wealth of $7.6 million, successful entrepreneurs do not want to stop there. Their objective is to increase their assets by a further 40%. Half of them plan to achieve this in just 5 years, and 71% in 10 years, according to the BNP Paribas Wealth Management study conducted with Scorpio Partnership among 2500 of them in 17 countries.

• They started out young. The idea of starting a business originated in them at just 30 years old. At an average age of 32, they had taken action, whereas the previous generation had waited until the age of 39 on average to reach this milestone. In some countries, they think about it even earlier (only 24.5 years in Turkey).

• The sectors they love most of all for their business are financial services, distribution, technology, real estate, construction and software.

• Their assets to succeed? Family first and foremost: 60% of them already had an entrepreneur in their immediate circle. The rate even rises to more than 75% in Taiwan, Spain, Poland, Turkey, and the Gulf countries. But they also feel that they have been helped by their education, the career they had before starting a business, their network of contacts and associates,…

• More than a third of them (37%) are women. But in France, as in India and Hong Kong, the women’s entrepreneurial community is larger than elsewhere, accounting for half of all successful entrepreneurs. “They often have more success than men,” notes Sebastian Dovey of Scorpio Partnership. Their companies have higher sales than those founded by men ($9.1 million versus $8.4 million). They also create more societies than men (4.9 for them compared to an average of 4.3 for them).

• The country at the forefront of entrepreneurship is China. But it is in Hong Kong that the number of companies founded by the same entrepreneur beats records (10.2 on average). Switzerland is in second place, with an average of 6.3 companies. And it is in the United Kingdom that the rate of successful multi-entrepreneurs is highest (21%).