How I turned $25,000 into over $1 bn: Investment tips and life lessons from billionaire Dr Sudhir Ruparelia Dr Sudhir Ruparelia is arguably Uganda’s richest man and one of East Africa’s wealthiest businessmen. His Ruparelia Group, comprising of over 28 companies, has tentacles in real estate, financial services, education services, hospitality, horticulture, media/broadcasting and most recently, labour externalization. But he wasn’t born rich- he is your basic started-from-the-bottom-now-we-are-here businessman. Form being a 17-year old student, he suddenly found himself on London streets looking for a job, after President Idi Amin had expelled Ugandans of Asian origin in 1972. After failing to join the UK’s Royal Armed Force’s he did several jobs, including being a supermarket attendant, to being a cab driver as he juggled his studies until he finished High School. In 1985, he returned to Uganda armed with about $25,000 in savings and since then, he has never looked back. Through a series of greenfield investments, acquisitions, joint ventures and expansions he, with the support of family, has grown the Ruparelia Group into a well over $1.1 billion conglomerate. In a recent extensive interview with www.billionairetomorrow.com’s Chris Bishop, Dr Ruparelia gave a series of advice on how to build a billion-dollar empire from almost nothing. CEO East Africa Magazine has revisited the interview to pick on several pieces of wisdom from one of the most prolific businessmen of our times.