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Extreme Nick Woodman
Any place that you go where extreme activity is taking place; you will certainly encounter a GoPro camera, the brand that in the last month alone sold $100 million dollars worth of products. Woodman is the brains behind GoPro, the camera that can be attached to any point of motion. To the body, clothing, hats as well as to equipment and accessories which makes it ideal for use by sportsmen and action lovers.
Woodman hit upon the idea while surfing in Indonesia and Australia and was searching for a method of filming himself while engaging in sporting activities. The cameras he developed support WiFi, are remotely controlled and feature 64GB of memory. They are water proof and inexpensive selling in the $300 range. Thus virtually anyone can film himself skiing on Alpine slopes, surfing on giant waves in Hawaii or Bungee jumping in Australia. These cameras are used by both amateurs and professionals and may be found with Hollywood directors, football players and law enforcement and military officers. The Rolling Stones used them on stage and they are also used by those who bring us those rare pictures from the mouths of sharks and alligators.
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Woodman received his sobriquet the “mad billionaire” due to his childish behavior and eccentricities that he cultivates deliberately, however his path to the summit was not easy. Following receipt of his degree in Visual Arts from the University of California, San Diego he founded a marketing company called funBag that was not successful. At the age of 26 he decided to travel and surf in order to find inspiration. He surfed in Indonesia and Australia for some five months with a 35mm camera attached to the palm of his hand usually by a rubber band, although this was very awkward and tended to fall.
In order to solve this problem he developed and built a belt that would attach a camera to the body. In order to finance the project he and the women who today is his wife, Jill bought shell necklaces for $1.90 each in Bali which they sold from their car along the California coast for $60. With the money they earned together with $35, 000 borrowed from his mother they were in business.
In 2004 GoPro achieved its first success when a Japanese firm ordered 100 cameras at a sports show at which it was exhibited. From that year on, GroPro more than doubled its sales every year. In 2012 the company sold 2.3 million cameras. Foxconn a Chinese electronic company recognized the huge potential of the company and in December 2012 invested 200 million dollars in it. Thus the value of the company rose to 2.25 billion dollars and introduced Woodman into the Forbes Billionaire club.
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