Podcasts · Business

Great Business Stories

Caemin

84 episodes

A great business story thoroughly researched and brought to life by Caemin. New episode released every Wednesday .

Episodes page 1 of 2

  1. Tim Cook: Who Would Have Thought?

    · 31 min

    The fact is that I never gave this guy a chance- of course i was wrong so I was intrigued to find out how this humble but very smart guy who took on probably the hardest CEO role by having to follow in the footsteps of…

  2. Richard Branson: 1950-1993

    · 32 min

    I would say more than anyone else, Richard Branson was the guy who inspired me to become an entrepreneur- I have a terrible memory but I remember so vividly Branson’s first appearance on the Late Late Show- that was…

  3. General Magic: Right Product, Wrong Time

    · 31 min

    I had heard about General Magic over the years- and it was always held up as this almost mythical startup- the company that more or less developed the smartphone but was years too early, and then just 2 weeks ago I…

  4. Olympus: A Very Japanese Scandal

    · 31 min

    I have a very clear memory of this story because it became public 15 years ago in 2011, and I remember watching the news and seeing Michael Woodford, the whistleblower being mobbed by the media in Tokyo after he had…

  5. Ken Griffin: Wall Street’s Ultimate Competitor

    · 29 min

    Griffin has been on my list from day 1- like he’s the 32nd richest person in the world with a net worth of $60 billion, but I was in no real rush to cover him, until about 2 weeks ago when I finally got round to…

  6. Ben & Jerry’s 1978-2026 RIP

    · 29 min

    The RIP part, well you’ll see what I’m getting at by the end of the episode. I wanted to dig into this story for a while now because like most of you, I knew the outline -you know, 2 hippy type guys who did things a…

  7. Brian Chesky and Airbnb: The $100 Billion Bad Idea

    · 32 min

    Look, I’d be lying if I said I’d always wanted to cover Chesky and Airbnb. I hadn’t really read much about either of them. The business itself sounds pretty humdrum. People renting out apartments, spare rooms. Nothing…

  8. Peter Thiel: 1967–2002

    · 31 min

    As regular listeners will know, I’ve wanted to cover Thiel for some time now. He’s going to warrant a three-parter at least because, love him or loathe him, Thiel is without doubt one of the most interesting,…

  9. Enzo Ferrari: The Obsession Behind the Prancing Horse

    · 32 min

    Now I’m not a big petrol head, but as some of you might know, I love Formula 1, and I think it's fair to say that Formula 1 wouldn’t be where it is today without Ferrari—so I was really keen to dig into this. And what…

  10. Bernie Ebbers & WorldCom - When The Tide Goes Out…

    · 30 min

    The whole WorldCom scandal never really registered with me- because it happened straight after the dotcom bubble burst, so myself and my cofounders were just dusting ourselves off and slowly realising that we weren’t…

  11. The Rise and Ruin of the Barclay Twins

    · 33 min

    This is the remarkable story of how David and Frederick Barclay went from painters and decorators to owning the most prestigious hotels in London: the Ritz, Claridge's, the Connaught, the Berkeley. They bought the…

  12. Microsoft 1994-2000: How Bill Gates Turned a Browser War Into an Antitrust Disaster

    · 32 min

    This is, without doubt, one of my favourite stories ever. And look, I'll be doing a good few episodes on Gates and Microsoft, but why I decided to start off with this one is because it's a fantastic standalone story.…

  13. John Foley and Peloton: What Went Wrong?

    · 30 min

    I wanted to dig into this story purely because what I knew of Peloton really was just from the headlines. During the pandemic, stock pickers and the business media crowned Peloton the business of the future. It was…

  14. Yuri Milner: From Russia With Billions

    · 30 min

    I've wanted to cover Milner ever since I first came across him in Sebastian Mallaby's excellent book, The Power Law, where Mallaby introduces Milner with the following: "At the start of 2009, the CFO at Facebook took…

  15. Steve Ballmer: 1956–2000

    · 33 min

    And let me start with a quote: "I didn't pull you out of Stanford Business School to bankrupt the company" — that's Bill Gates, early on, arguing with the man he'd just hired as Microsoft's first ever business manager.…

  16. BlockBuster: The Men & Moments Behind Its Rise and Fall

    · 31 min

    There are so many great characters in this story — I dig into the founder, David Cook, a guy who sold the business for $12 million but could have made $300 million if he'd stayed on for just a few more years. And then…

  17. Carlos Slim: The Numbers Genius Who Built an Empire

    · 31 min

    This is a guy whose father fled Lebanon with almost nothing and today is worth $120 billion. I examine how he built his fortune buying up distressed businesses during Mexico's economic collapse of the 1980s, and how a…

  18. CZ and Binance: The Man Who Built Crypto's Biggest Empire

    · 32 min

    This is a guy who grew up in a village in rural China with no running water and today is now worth $110 billion. I examine his relationship with Sam Bankman Fried- and his subsequent involvement in the multi billion…

  19. Hyundai Part 1: Chung Ju-yung, The Founder

    · 33 min

    Initially I had intended to do just 1 episode on Hyundai, focusing mainly on the car business and it’s current leadership, but the story of Ju-yung is just too remarkable to be consigned to a footnote- this is a guy…

  20. Calvin Klein:An American Icon

    · 31 min

    Now, I’m not into fashion and I really didn’t know anything about Klein before I did my research for this episode and I found him to be such a fascinating character-how he, together with Ralph Lauren and Ann Klein, no…

  21. David Sacks: Silicon Valley's Rainmaker

    · 31 min

    Sacks is a very interesting and powerful figure. He started his tech career with PayPal, and it was Sacks, together with other PayPal founders, who organised the coup that got Elon Musk fired as PayPal's CEO. He went…

  22. Roberto Calvi: Italy’s Corruption Laid Bare

    · 32 min

    This is a story that I’ve wanted to get to the bottom of for years- for those of you who aren’t aware of who Calvi is- he was known as God’s Banker- the guy who managed the vatican;s money back in the 70’s and early…

  23. Steven A. Cohen: The Master of Edge

    · 31 min · Explicit

    The edge in the title refers to an advantage that Cohen had over the rest of the market-because he is considered without doubt one of the best intuitive traders ever- good enough that he took home $3.5 billion last…

  24. Michael O Leary: The Jumped-Up Paddy Who Doesn’t Give a Shit

    · 30 min · Explicit

    I chose this episode not only because it’s brilliant, but also because my youngest listener and favourite nephew has been bugging me to do the story of a leary for a long time now I’ll start with an excerpt from a…

  25. Sam Altman: 1985-2023

    · 34 min

    I’ll open up with an excerpt from a fantastic New Yorker article on Altman: "Altman has a relentless will to power that, even among industrialists who put their names on spaceships, sets him apart- and according to an…

  26. Philip Green: The Unacceptable Face of Capitalism

    · 30 min

    I’m going to kick it off with this excerpt from Oliver Shah’s excellent book on Green called Damaged Goods: “Mr Toad-like in appearance, with a bulging belly and a mischievous grin, Green turned into a business…

  27. Bill Ackman: 1966–2008

    · 33 min

    I’m breaking up Ackman’s story into three, maybe even four parts because, like him or loathe him, Ackman is a very interesting character. I’ll kick it off with a quote from Carl Icahn, the legendary Wall Street…

  28. Ross Perot: Shorty Got Game

    · 36 min

    I’m having a bit of a dig at Ross Perot’s height, but for a little guy, this guy had a lot of game—not just as a businessman. This guy could have been the US President. Here is a quote from Time Magazine from 1992,…

  29. Boeing 747: The Plane That Shrank the World

    · 32 min

    I’ll start with a quote from 2023 at a ceremony to announce and celebrate the retirement of the jumbo jet: ""“It is the most well thought out and safest aircraft ever built. Even when you understand the science behind…

  30. Friendster: How They Blew It

    · 30 min

    I just love this story - it has everything - Jonathan Abrams, a young, smart coder from Canada, moved to California because he wanted to be at the very heart of the internet boom. And on nothing more than an intuition,…

  31. Kerry Packer: The Billionaire Who Played the Biggest Hands

    · 32 min

    I’ve wanted to dig into Packers life for a long time now, because one thing I’ve come to know from over 35 years of reading business stories is that when it comes to big characters with the most drama- the media…

  32. BCCI: The Most Corrupt Bank in the World

    · 30 min

    This is the remarkable story of how Agha Abedi built BCCI, a global bank founded in Pakistan that was revered by its ordinary customers and employees. Abedi was seen as more than just a banker- a visionary and…

  33. The Gold Ring Scandal of 1869

    · 27 min

    This, I promise you, is one of the most audacious and just jaw dropping financial schemes that I’ve ever come across. Two young outsiders initially taking on and beating Cornelius Vanderbilt, the richest man in America…

  34. Michael Rubin of Fanatics: The Man Who Never Stops Selling

    · 29 min

    This guy is non stop business- even when he’s partying, it’s business. Here’s guy who owned 5 retail stores while still in high school, was making millions by the time he was 18, was CEO of a public company at just 23…

  35. Ingvar Kamprad of IKEA: Frugal, Focused, Flawed and Fascinating

    · 33 min

    I know what you’re thinking- the Swedish guy who built IKEA- kind of boring - right. But as regular listeners will know by now, I love business, not just the scandals or the high tension battles, but I love finding out…

  36. Yahoo- 1994-March 2000

    · 29 min

    Regular listeners will know that I have a special grá as we’d say in Ireland or a love for the whole internet bubble era- it’s when I first got into business and it was such a wild time, and the yahoo story…

  37. George Soros: Big Bets and Big Backlash

    · 32 min

    Soros’s life is extraordinary. A Jewish teenager who survived the Nazi occupation, fled communist Hungary with almost nothing, and went on to build one of the most remarkable investing careers in modern history. We’re…

  38. Alex Karp of Palantir: The Philosopher CEO Who Never Doubts

    · 34 min

    Karp is, without question, one of the most unlikely, outspoken, and polarising CEOs in the world — a hyperactive, self-proclaimed neo-Marxist and a classical liberal who built Palantir, a software company involved in…

  39. Paul Singer: The World's Most Feared Investor

    · 29 min

    I borrowed the title from a Bloomberg article on Singer where they also described him as aggressive, tenacious and litigious to a fault. I’ve wanted to cover Singer and his firm Ellliott management event since I read…

  40. Nick Leeson — The Barrow Boy Who Bankrupted a Bank

    · 29 min

    This is a story I was completely enthralled by when it broke back in 1995. Leeson’s face was splashed across every newspaper in the days after he disappeared, having brought down Barings Bank by concealing massive…

  41. Sean Parker: The Vilified Visionary of the Valley

    · 31 min

    Like most of you, my perception of Parker was as a reckless party boy who somehow inserted himself into 3 of the most influential internet companies—Napster, Facebook and Spotify. Through the movie The Social Network,…

  42. Bernard Arnault: 1949–1997

    · 31 min

    This has been one of my favourite stories to research — because this story is just that good. It begins with a young engineer running a small construction company, he has an epiphany in the back of a New York taxi.…

  43. Chamath Palihapitiya: Lofty Ideals, Calculated Moves

    · 31 min

    Promoted at just 26 to head AOL’s messaging platform, then spearheaded Facebook's growth helping to grow it from 15 million users to 840 million, buying 10% of the Golden State Warriors for just $25 million, being the…

  44. Sir James Goldsmith – From Corporate Raiding to Political Crusading

    · 32 min

    Here's a guy who won the equivalent of £350,000 on a horse race when he was just 16 years old, made international headlines at 21 for eloping with the daughter of one of the world's richest men, employed 400 people by…

  45. Jesse Livermore: The Best Trader Ever?

    · 28 min

    I wanted to dig into Livermore’s story ever since i came across him in the episode we did on short sellers- and what a story this is- he became a full time trader the age of 16, he built his own system that earned him…

  46. Tony Hsieh: The Man Who Sold Happiness

    · 32 min

    Hsieh sold his first company when he was just 26 years old for $265 million. He then built Zappos into an online retailing giant from zero revenue to $2 billion dollars and in doing so he really did revolutionise…

  47. The Richest Man in the World You've Never Heard Of

    · 31 min

    This is the amazing story of Yoshiaki Tsutsumi (tsoo-TSOO-mee)- who for 4 years solid from 1987-1990 was ranked the richest person in the world, the most powerful and probably revered business person in Japan…

  48. Mark Cuban - The Lucky Billionaire

    · 30 min

    I’m being a bit flippant here because this is a guy who worked hard for his money- he became a millionaire at 31 and then proceeded to build a company that had the most successful IPO opening day in history up to that…

  49. Sam Waksal: The Improbable Rise, Fall & Redemption

    · 30 min

    2001 was Sam Waksal’s year. Seven years after discovering Erbitux — the so-called wonder drug — everything seemed to be falling into place. The drug had made it onto the cover of Business Week, Waksal’s company…

  50. Jeff Bezos 1964-1999

    · 29 min

    It was the autumn of 1996. Jeff Bezos had just raised eight million dollars, putting Amazon’s valuation at around sixty million. Revenue that year was $15.7 million, small yes, but growing at a huge rate and it had…

Shows are listed from Apple Podcasts' charts and directory, and Podcast Index where it is used. Every show and episode belongs to its publisher and plays from the publisher's own feed; this site hosts none of them. Explicit shows are for adult profiles only, and children’s profiles hear only children’s shows. More about this list.