Yakobashvili David Mikhailovich - co-founder of the company "Wimm-Bill-Dann" (WBD). Member of a large number of charitable and cultural educational institutions. Head of the RSPP. This article will describe a brief biography of a businessman.
School
1957 is the year when David Mikhailovich Yakobashvili was born. The boy’s family has Georgian and Jewish roots. Parents sent David to school with a medical bias. Although Yakobashvili himself dreamed of becoming a diplomat. Later, he abandoned this idea because of his last name. After graduating from school, David entered the Polytechnic Institute (Tbilisi) with a degree in Civil and Industrial Engineering. Soon, financial difficulties began in the family. The young man had to quit school and go to work.
Growing piglets
During the day, David Yakobashvili worked at the Laboratory of the Metallurgical University, and at night he worked as a laborer in Metrostroy. Subsequently, he began recording and repairing audio equipment. Then David got a private security and installed alarm systems in the houses. In 1982, one program appeared for employees of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. Its essence was that they were allowed to take piglets for growing, and then return them to the state and receive money for the difference in weight. I also added to this idea. Together with a friend, he built a small farm outside the city and brought 200 piglets there. A year later, the future head of Wimm-Bill-Dann surrendered the animals and made a profit.
First business
In the 1980s, David Mikhailovich Yakobashvili decided to leave Georgia. He lived in Sweden, Finland and Germany, where he worked as a driver and cleaner. In 1988, a young man came to Moscow. Familiar Finns asked David for help in finding a company manufacturing parts for Euro pallets. Yakobashvili quickly found the right plant and earned the first big money - 22.5 thousand marks. After that, he immediately bought a Mercedes.
In 1988, David and his friends opened the first floating hotel on the Moscow River in the capital. Then he created the Trinity company. At the same time, he acquired a stake in the health salon "Ginseng" on Pokrovka. This institution was the first Soviet cooperative. Trinity's largest business was selling used American cars. Together with partners, Yakobashvili traveled to the United States for Chevrolet and Cadillacs. David also drove a trucker from Finland. In 1991, the hero of this article opened a General Motors dealer center in Russia. In addition, Yakobashvili was engaged in neon advertising, furnishing the Metropol Hotel, and also put the first anti-theft radio beacons on cars.
Wimm-Bill-Dann
This company appeared in Russia in 1992. Sergey Plastinin, David Yakobashvili, Mikhail Dubinin and other partners rented a juice bottling line at the Lianozovsky Dairy Plant . And they took a loan of $ 50 thousand for start-up capital. Initially, juices bore the name of the company itself, consonant with the English Wimbledon. And in 1994, the founders came up with the brand J7 (Seven Juices). After 12 months, WBD bought back the shares of the Lianozovo plant.
IPO
In 2002, Wimm-Bill-Dann held an initial public offering of securities on the New York Stock Exchange. Thus, it became the first food company in Russia to carry out an IPO. WBD placement was estimated at $ 830 million. Most of the shares were acquired by the French Danone. Before the IPO Wimm-Bill-Dann procedure, it reliably and fully disclosed all the necessary information about itself in the prospectus. It was even indicated that one of the shareholders of the company (Gavriil Yushvaev) had a previous criminal record.
Hobbies
David Yakobashvili loves karting, deep-sea swimming and riding a motorcycle. For many people, the businessman is known as a collector of musical instruments and antique items. The Russian press wrote a lot about this. The vast meeting of the businessman has no world analogues.
Collection history
In the 1980s, David Yakobashvili, whose biography is presented above, traveled to Sweden to earn money. First, the young man looked after the sick, and then he took up driving cars from there to the Russian Federation. In Sweden, David made friends with Bill Lidwall, a mechanical tools collector and construction company director. In 2000, he decided to hand over to Yakobashvili his collection of self-playing antique instruments. Bill was very sick and was afraid that the children would sell the valuable collection after his death. And he truly trusted the hero of this article.
David Yakobashvili continued the work of Lidval. Now in his collection you can find many unique tools. For example, two small mechanical organs from France. At one time they were owned by Louis XVII and Louis XVIII (monarchs). These are rare instruments that exist in a single copy. David also has a symphony owned by Adolf Hitler. And in the collection of Yakobashvili there are rare barrel-organs of the Italian master Bachi Galupo. The first of them dates from the beginning of the XVIII century.