(01-07-2021, 09:39 AM)homebiscuit Wrote:

(01-06-2021, 06:40 PM)Jags Wrote: I agree with you, but... khan didn’t build that business from the ground up.  He worked there for a while and then bought it.  Not to take anything away from it.  Dude is definitely a master businessman.  But it seems like the business was already established.  Still, I’m trying to figure out how a man became a billionaire selling bumpers.  But whatever.

From what I understand, it was his innovation of a single piece bumper that propelled him upwards. It was a money and time saver for auto manufacturers who contracted with his business, Flex-N-Gate, for parts. The rest is hi$tory.

He started it while a student at the University of Illinois as a Mechanical Engineer;
He worked for Flex Gate but then also started his own company Bumper Works in 1978. (It's not clear whether he was still working for Flex Gate while running is own Bumper Works company or had left Flex Gate.

It says in 1980 he bought Flex Gate. And the rest is history.

"Khan worked at the automotive manufacturing company Flex-N-Gate Corporation while attending the University of Illinois. When he graduated he was hired as the engineering director for the company. In 1978, he started Bumper Works, which made car bumpers for customized pickup trucks and body shop repairs.[9] The funds to start the new business included a $50,000 loan from the Small Business Administration and $16,000 of his own savings.[15]
In 1980, he bought Flex-N-Gate from his former employer Charles Gleason Butzow, bringing Bumper Works into the fold. Khan grew the company so that it supplied bumpers for the Big Three automakers. In 1984, he began supplying a small number of bumpers for Toyota pickups. By 1987 it was the sole supplier for Toyota pickups and by 1989 it was the sole supplier for the entire Toyota line in the United States. Adopting The Toyota Way increased company efficiency and ability to change its manufacturing process within a few minutes.[9][16] Since then, the company has grown from $17 million in sales to an estimated $2 billion in 2010 to $8.89 billion in 2020.[17]
By 2011, Flex-N-Gate had 12,450 employees and 48 manufacturing plants in the United States and several other countries[10] and in 2018 had a revenue of $8.3 billion and was ranked as the 49th largest private USA company by Forbes.[18]It is also ranked by Automotive News as 7th largest American automotive parts supplier and overall 33rd largest supplier in the world.
In May 2012, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration fined Flex-N-Gate $57,000 for health violations at its Urbana plant.[19] Before the 2012 NFL Draft, the United Automobile Workers (UAW) and other environmentalist groups organized a campaign for several accusations against Flex-N-Gate and Khan.[20][21]"

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