Stories
Stories
Checking in with One Championship
Photo by Yen Meng Jiin
Photo by Yen Meng Jiin
As a student at HBS, Chatri Sityodtong (MBA 1999) lived on four dollars a day, teaching the martial arts discipline of Muay Thai and sending the extra cash home to his mother and brother in Bangkok. “Everything I owned could fit into a single suitcase,” he recently told the Business Times of Singapore.
Then his fortunes changed, a dramatic turnaround documented in this Bulletin profile. After founding and selling a startup with two HBS classmates, Sityodtong headed to Wall Street, working for several large investment funds before launching his own. A multimillionaire by his late 30s, he was “successful” on paper but not in his heart. After realizing his real passion was for martial arts, Sityodtong launched Evolve MMA, a mixed martial arts gym with three branches in Singapore. Out of that enterprise came One Championship, a sports and media organization that stages MMA events across Asia, with stops ranging from Kuala Lumpur to Manila to Beijing. In July, Heliconia Capital Management invested an undisclosed eight-figure sum in the business, which Sityodtong hopes to take public.
“One of the many life lessons I picked up from my teacher in Thailand is that it doesn’t matter if you win or lose, but whether you have given it your all and you fought with all your heart,” Sityodtong said. “So long as you’ve done that, then you’ve accomplished your goals.”
Post a Comment
Related Stories
-
- 23 Mar 2023
- HBS Alumni News
Winners Crowned in 2023 Alumni New Venture Competition
Re: Ben Dupont (PLDA 20); Ilana Springer (MBA 2022); Eric Gruskin (MBA 2022); Mariah Wood (MBA 2022); Vanessa Royle (MBA 2022); Janvi Shah (MBA 2022); Sylvan Guo (MBA 2022); Nicole Clay (MBA 2022); Jodi Gernon (MBA 1991) -
- 01 Mar 2023
- HBS Alumni Bulletin
Elevator Pitch: Spread the Wealth
Re: Sabine Tejerina (MBA 2009) -
- 01 Mar 2023
- HBS Alumni Bulletin
Step Change
Re: Amal Enan (MBA 2014); By: Julia Hanna; photographed by Abdelrahman Gabr – Koree -
- 23 Feb 2023
- HBS Alumni Bulletin
In My Humble Opinion: Hometown Reboot
Re: David Motley (MBA 1988); Rosabeth M. Kanter (Ernest L. Arbuckle Professor of Business Administration); By: April White
Stories Featuring Chatri Trisiripisal
-
- 21 May 2016
- Forbes
Homegrown Heroes
Re: Chatri Trisiripisal (MBA 1999) -
- 07 Apr 2015
- HBS Alumni Bulletin
Warrior Spirit
Re: Chatri Trisiripisal (MBA 1999); Soon Loo (MBA 1999); Kathleen Martens (MBA 1999); By: Julia Hanna
