Things began to pick up after World Wide Technology won certain government contracts as a minority-owned small business. In 1993, a collection company repossessed Steward’s two-year-old Lincoln Continental sedan from the office parking lot, forcing him to run after it. Kavanaugh scrambled to seal the deal on several contracts. Eventually, they fell behind in their payments for a $1 million line of credit. While Kavanaugh and Steward brought along a few former clients, including AT&T and Southwestern Bell, they weren’t getting a ton of other business. I earned my equity over time and have no regrets,” he says. “I wouldn’t recommend this route, but it all worked out. It wasn’t until 1995, after he had proved his worth, that he got his first 15% slice. Kavanaugh, then 28, had zero cash to put up and received no equity. In 1990, World Wide Technology was born, a humble reseller of printers, computers and telephonic equipment. Steward not only agreed to come on board but also contributed all-important startup money, some $250,000. And this is where Steward came into the picture-Kavanaugh’s boss knew Steward and talked him into joining them. A year later, in 1989, he and his boss began to discuss starting their own electronics distributor. He responded to a newspaper ad from Future Electronics, an electronics distributor, and was hired to sell chips and other circuit-board components. Wide World Technology facilities Tim Pannell for Forbes That team was in obvious financial straits, and seeing the writing on the locker-room wall, Kavanaugh decided to hang up his cleats. In 1986 he was drafted by the Los Angeles Lazers and moved across the country with $25 in his pocket. Louis University: “If I didn’t get a scholarship, there’s probably a good chance I would have gone into construction.” He earned a spot on the 1984 Olympic team and the Pan-American team, traveling to more than two dozen countries. In 1981, he left home to play soccer for St. Louis, where his father worked as a bricklayer and his mother stayed at home with the three children. “I knew then that tech was changing the way we do business,” Steward says.Īs for Kavanaugh, he grew up in St. He figures it was the largest such network in St. To do so, Steward had to build a local area network from scratch, essentially connecting dozens of computers so that they could talk to one another. It asked him to sift through $15 billion worth of bills from a three-year stretch. His first big client: former employer Union Pacific. In 1987 he started a sister company, Transport Administrative Services, which helped shipping companies evaluate discounts offered to customers. He acquired a company called Transportation Business Specialists, which audited shipping invoices for companies like Ford, Pfizer and Campbell’s Soup and uncovered overcharges. He went on to work in sales and marketing for Union Pacific and then FedEx, where he was inducted into the sales department’s hall of fame. He wasn’t making much money, though, so he continued to apply for jobs, sending out some 400 résumés in three years before connecting at the Missouri Pacific Railroad-his “dream job,” he says-where Steward was one of the first African-American sales reps. After graduating in 1973, Steward worked as a substitute teacher and for the Boy Scouts of America. The next year the coach put him on the team and gave him an athletic scholarship. When Steward left for Central Missouri University in 1969, his father’s work ethic stuck with him, and even though the six-foot-five freshman didn’t make the basketball team that year, he showed up to watch practice every day. World Wide Technology's other half, cofounder David Steward. For some perspective, Steward’s $3 billion stake in World Wide Tech makes him the second-wealthiest African-American in America, richer than Oprah ($2.6 billion) and Michael Jordan ($1.9 billion). Kavanaugh owns 36% of the company, a $2.1 billion stake, and Steward has 59%, $3.4 billion. Louis resulted in $11.2 billion in revenue last year and an estimated profit of $700 million. The company serves not only corporate America but also federal, state, local governments, which send their baffled bureaucrats to Kavanaugh and Steward to equip courthouses, military bases, prisons and schools. They make virtually nothing themselves, but they take a cut on every item sold, plus charge a fee for add-on services like consulting, testing and installation. Together, the pair have hit on one of the surest ways to profit from technology and its ever-shifting nature. The other is its chairman, David Steward, 68, the salesman to Kavanaugh’s wonk. Kavanaugh is one half of World Wide Technology. World Wide Technology's cofounder Jim Kavanaugh.
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