Djoko Susanto

Djoko is the sixth out of 10 siblings, he only reached the 1st grade. He had to drop out of school due to a policy of the New order government that prohibits students with Chinese sounding names from attending public schools (he later on changed his name so that he could continue his studies). At the age of 17 he started managing his parents' modest 5-foot stall inside Pasar Arjuna, a traditional market in Jakarta. The stall sold groceries at the time, but soon Djoko was peddling cigarettes and opening more stalls. His success attracted the attention of clove cigarette tycoon Putera Sampoerna. Together they opened similar stalls and then opened a discount supermarket chain.

Djoko continued his partnership with Putera Sampoerna until 2005, then Sampoerna sold his cigarettes business, 70% of his share to Altria including his share on the retail business run by Djoko. Altria did not desire on retail business and then sold their shares to Northstar, but Djoko later bought the shares from Northstar, making him own the major share of 65%. He later developed the retail business into Alfa Supermarket. Nowadays, under the management of PT. Sumber Alfaria Trijaya Tbk, they run more than 5,500 stores under several brands such as Alfamart, Alfa Express, Alfa Midi and Lawson. Thus business made Djoko become the 25th wealthiest person in Indonesia on 2011, and rose to rank 17th on early 2012, decrease to 20th by November 2012.[1]

• Forbes.com
• Tempo.co