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Reinhold Würth
Born
Germany, fasteners. Würth took over his father's two-person screw wholesaler in Künzelsau in 1954, aged 19, and built the Würth Group into the world's leading seller of screws, fixings and assembly materials to tradespeople. The specialism was distribution rather than invention: a huge direct sales force visiting workshops and building sites, opening subsidiaries country by country from the 1960s.
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Artur Fischer
Born
Germany, fixings. Fischer, a prolific inventor from the Black Forest, patented the grey nylon wall plug in 1958, a small part that made fixing things to walls quick and reliable. His company in Waldachtal built a worldwide business around fixings, and he held more than a thousand patents, including an early synchronised camera flash. He died in 2016.
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Andreas Stihl
Germany, chainsaws. Stihl founded his company near Stuttgart in 1926 and in 1929 produced a petrol-powered "tree-felling machine", leading the way towards portable chainsaws for forestry. Stihl concentrated on hand-held power tools for forests and gardens and sold them through specialist dealers who serviced what they sold, a model that carried it into markets worldwide. He died in 1973.
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Berthold Leibinger
Born
Germany, machine tools. Leibinger joined Trumpf in Ditzingen as an apprentice and engineer, became its owner, and turned it from a maker of sheet-metal shears into a world leader in laser cutting machines. His bet on industrial lasers in the 1980s gave Trumpf a technical edge that factories around the world paid for. He died in 2018.
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Karl Elsener (inventor)
Born
Switzerland, knives. Elsener opened a cutlery workshop in Ibach in 1884 and won the contract to supply the Swiss army with soldiers' knives, which German makers had previously supplied. His 1897 officer's knife, with springs that let more tools fit, became the Swiss Army knife. Victorinox, named after his mother, turned a military order into a global export staple.
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Hans Wilsdorf
Born
Switzerland and Britain, watches. Wilsdorf founded the business that became Rolex in London in 1905, moved it to Geneva after the First World War, and pushed wristwatches when pocket watches still dominated. The waterproof Oyster case of 1926 and constant marketing, such as a watch worn on a Channel swim, built international demand for a precise, durable luxury product. He died in 1960.
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Nicolas Hayek
Born
Switzerland, watches. Hayek, a Lebanese-born consultant, was asked by banks in the early 1980s to advise on Switzerland's collapsing watch industry, battered by cheap Japanese quartz. Instead of selling the brands, he merged two failing groups into what became Swatch Group and backed the cheap, colourful plastic Swatch, which restored Swiss volume production and protected brands such as Omega. He died in 2010.
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Daniel Swarovski
Austria, crystal. Swarovski, a Bohemian glass cutter, patented an electric machine for cutting crystal precisely in 1892 and moved to Wattens in the Tyrol in 1895, where hydroelectric power could drive it. Precision-cut crystal stones for fashion and jewellery became the company's specialism and export trade, and it remained family-owned. He died in 1956.
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Ruben Rausing
Born
Sweden, packaging. Rausing co-founded the packaging firm Åkerlund & Rausing in Malmö and in 1951 set up Tetra Pak to make a tetrahedral paper carton for milk. Its later aseptic cartons let milk and juice keep for months without refrigeration, which made it valuable in hot countries without cold chains. Tetra Pak sold packaging machines and the cartons they used, a model that spread worldwide. He died in 1983.
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Américo Amorim
Born
Portugal, cork. Amorim took over his family's cork stopper business near Porto and made Corticeira Amorim the world's largest cork processor, buying bark across Portugal and selling stoppers to wineries worldwide. When plastic and screw-cap closures threatened the trade, the company invested in quality testing and new uses for cork, from flooring to insulation. He died in 2017.
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Joseph Bamford
Born
Britain, construction machinery. Bamford started JCB in a rented garage in Uttoxeter in 1945, building a tipping trailer from wartime scrap. Its backhoe loader, a tractor with a digger at the back and a shovel at the front, became so common abroad that "JCB" is used as the generic word for a digger in several countries. He pushed exports from the start and died in 2001.
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Leonardo Del Vecchio
Italy, eyewear. Del Vecchio, raised in a Milan orphanage, opened a workshop making spectacle parts in Agordo in 1961 and built Luxottica into the world's largest eyewear company. Its edge was controlling the whole chain: design, manufacture, licensed brands, Ray-Ban and Oakley, and shop chains such as Sunglass Hut, which let it sell Italian-made frames worldwide. He died in 2022.
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Brunello Cucinelli
Born
Italy, cashmere. Cucinelli started dyeing cashmere in bright colours in 1978, then built his company in the medieval hamlet of Solomeo in Umbria, which he restored. Selling expensive knitwear made by well-paid local artisans to wealthy customers abroad, with most of its sales outside Italy, became a model for craft-based luxury. He remains executive chairman and creative director.
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Mads Clausen
Denmark, refrigeration and heating controls. Clausen founded Danfoss in 1933 in the attic of his parents' farmhouse at Nordborg, making expansion valves for refrigerators. Danfoss grew into a leading maker of thermostats, valves and drives used in cooling, heating and industry, selling components to equipment makers worldwide from a rural corner of Denmark. He died in 1966.
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Francesco Illy
Born
Italy, coffee. Illy, a Hungarian-born accountant who settled in Trieste, founded illycaffè in 1933 and invented the Illetta, an early espresso machine using pressurised water rather than steam. He also developed packing coffee in inert gas to keep it fresh, which made it possible to ship roasted coffee abroad. His descendants built the brand on a single blend sold worldwide. He died in 1956.
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Daniel Borel
Switzerland, computer peripherals. Borel co-founded Logitech in 1981 in Apples, a village near Lausanne, with two university friends, and made it one of the world's largest makers of computer mice. The specialism was cheap, well-designed accessories made in volume, first for computer makers and then sold in shops worldwide. He chaired the company for many years.
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