Born in Beirut, Tony Hakim first ventured to Australia as a young boy before returning home two years later. In 1975, when the war started in Lebanon, Hakim moved back to Australia with his family where he completed his last year of school at Marist Brothers Pagewood. Enrolling for a telecoms technician course at Sydney Institute of Technology, he left early to take a job at Hypercom, a Sydney company that supplied hands-free phone systems to the large law firms. When the recession hit in the early 1980s, Hakim thought he could easily be made redundant like many people in the industry. Instead, he suggested a way owner David Soul could save money and Hakim could keep his job: Hakim would do the phone repairs on contract that were previously being done in-house by employees. The outsourcing was a success and Hakim quickly built his business – Sydney Communications – into an entity that supplied and installed telecom systems for major developments, including Grosvenor Place. As the telecoms industry deregulated, Hakim moved into PABX systems and then early mobile phones. During this time he also established other businesses in the building industry and internet technology such as SurroundPix, the interior-viewing video software that now features in the Sydney Morning Herald’s Domain web site. In 1998, he created NTG, a company that bundled phone systems and call time for small businesses. NTG listed on the Australian Stock Exchange in December 2000, after the bubble burst.

I had to learn all of my business lessons the hard way: try and fail; try and fail until I got it right. Now I have a chance to help those who are starting in life and want guidance in how to take an idea or an ambition and turn it into a business. I believe that the internet – with all it’s idea-sharing power – is the perfect vehicle for giving people some of the concepts that are crucial for starting, growing and running a business.

I have so much faith in Australia’s young talent – I see waves of young, smart people coming out of universities and TAFEs, yet when it comes to business I don’t see many who are trained in what business is actually like. This isn’t the fault of our young people: there are simply not the programs or the courses to show interested people how to be entrepreneurs. Smart youngsters can get university degrees in law, accounting and economics but they can’t find a way to learn the basics of setting up and growing a business of their own.

Ask an entrepreneur - http://www.entrepreneur.com/ask/index.