Kevin O’Leary once had a photo lab in his basement.
As a teenager, he did everything he could to follow his dreams of becoming a photographer. There was one issue – his father didn’t agree.
“He said you’re not well and you’re going to starve,” O’Leary said in a video posted by X. “He said you should go to college and get a degree, so I went on to do an MBA.” it ended up being a very important tool for me later on.”
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O’Leary previously explained why he thought an MBA, which costs an average of $231,420 for a top 10 program in the US, was worth it.
In a 2021 Facebook post, he wrote that this degree gave him a “start” and taught him “discipline,” turning him from a 20-year-old with bad study habits into someone who knows how to make money, defend his ideas, and. focus on his strength.
O’Leary graduated from the University of Western Ontario in 1980, which now costs $83,250 a year for domestic students.
Photography still played an important role in his life: After graduating, the first company he founded, Special Event Television, was a production company specializing in sports entertainment.
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“It was my attempt to get back to something I loved, which is photography and production, and make money doing that,” O’Leary said in the X video. “There was that science and that art coming together in my life.”
When I first wanted to be a photographer, my father told me I wasn’t good enough—I would starve. So, I got an MBA and ended up building and selling a company for $4.2 billion. Everything came together—business, intelligence, and the drive to win. I wouldn’t change a thing. pic.twitter.com/Xv8ttJFk2V
– Kevin O’Leary aka Mr. Wonderful (@kevinolearytv) September 17, 2024
O’Leary sold the company and used the proceeds to start SoftKey, which sold educational and entertainment software, in 1986. He and two of his business partners sold SoftKey to Mattel in 1999 for $4.2 billion.
Looking back, he has no regrets.
“All of those things made me who I am today, the good, the bad, and the ugly,” O’Leary said in the video. “And I wouldn’t change a thing.”
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